After seeing a staging of his work-in-progress "Huis Clos," a dance performance with elements of spoken word, role playing, and storytelling, I had the pleasure of having a conversation with Quaba Venza Ernest about his interdisciplinary world-building, and the many facets that make up these worlds. Emotionally impacted by the piece, I was happy to get to know some of the early building blocks of the dance, and the plays that influenced it.

With insight into the origin of Venza Dance, an interdisciplinary arts company centered in dance, his choreographing methods, and intent of staying far away from boxes as an artist, Quaba and I were able to dive a little deeper into the working hand of the subconscious through the artist and how our relatives, ancestors, and the artists we've grown up on inspire the art making and even infuse themselves into our stories, with or without our awareness.

While music, or rhythm, is the one body that weaves different practices together (dance, poetry, instrumentation, singing), Quaba gives insight into his and his family's history with music and how the thread has led to Ernest Records, a recording studio and production company in Brooklyn, NY, which holds space for musicians and poets to share from the depths of their souls, with open reception and caring attention.

Carving through wood, painting, and carefully placing grain into place to depict whole worlds of Black and African people, Prince De León is an artist who spends her time making art as a labor of love and a conversation with self. Together, the two of us revisit some of the most fruitful places in Philadelphia, a city that lives so fully in both of our hearts, and I got to learn about her art making process as a Liberian artist whose evolution, as a human, is solely connected to her art.

We sit with a very important early work of hers--a piece called "African Booty Scratcher"--inspired by the book "Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto" by Legacy Russel, and influenced by Basquiat's style of self-portrait. As artists who speak from a place of truth and memory, it felt good to be in conversation with someone whose art making process is a dance with identity and memory; someone who can understand the inner workings imbedded into such a way of making.

What would I do if I couldn't fail? This is the question I've come to ponder and dwell after this conversation.

Jhelan Gordon-Salaam is a choreographer, movement artist, teacher, fellow deep feeler, and fellow reader who I've gotten the chance to meet during my time spent in Philadelphia. The two of us go beneath the surface and comb through the ways in which Dance has infused itself into our personal worlds and even return to the earlier tender places where it all began.

With our very different experiences and timelines, we both come together to provide each other with perspective and support in reclaiming what our journeys mean, and sift through the different lenses that the art form provides.