The Dance Department at Skidmore College and the Department of Theatre and Dance at Union College have joined forces to host a two-day residency by Baye & Asa on October 29 and 30. The guest artists will spend one day teaching students on each campus and there will be two events open to the public.
Baye & Asa is a dance company creating movement art projects directed and choreographed by Amadi ‘Baye’ Washington and Sam ‘Asa’ Pratt. The two grew up together in New York City. Their shared educational history is the mother of their work with Hip Hop and African dance languages as the foundation of their technique and informing the way they confront contemporary dance, theater and film.
On Wednesday, October 29, Baye & Asa will be at Union College. They will teach two classes for theatre and dance students and participate in a film screening with discussion. At Skidmore on Thursday, October 30, the pair will teach three classes as well as engage in dialogue with the institution’s Miranda Fellows, a program intended to create access for students to education and long-term support that helps to advance careers in theater, dance, music and arts administration.
Offerings open to the public include an Advanced Beginner/Intermediate dance technique class in the Henle Dance Pavilion at Union College on Wednesday, October 29, 2025 from 5pm to 6:30pm. No registration or fees are required for participating. On that same day, the second public offering will take place from 7:30 to 8:30pm in Old Chapel on the Union campus. In collaboration with Union’s Film Studies Program, Baye & Asa’s film Second Seed will be screened. In this and an ongoing body of work, Pratt and Washington respond choreographically to D.W. Griffith’s 1915 silent film The Birth of a Nation based on Thomas Dixon’s novel The Clansman.
The screening will be followed by a discussion with the guest artists. It will be moderated by James A. de Sève, Artist-in-Residence and Co-Director of the Film Studies Program at Union College. No registration or fees are required for participating.
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