Choreographer... Ni'Ja Whitson (B.A. Oberlin College, MFA The School of the Art Institute of Chicago) is a transdisciplinary performance and visual artist.  Her works include collaborations with international performers and musicians, solo dance and performance works, experimental video, and installation.  As a choreographer and performer she has worked for a range of artists from Caroline Jackson-Smith (an apprentice of the late August Wilson) to burlesque stages where she performed alongside Margaret Cho and Julie Atlas-Muz. She is a performing member of the cross-disciplinary improvisational collective, Inventions led by international performer/artist Douglas Ewart, resulting in collaborations with Tatsu Aoki, Dee Alexander, and Joseph Jarman, among others.  Her new work, Displacement was featured in the Margaret Burroughs Gallery at the South Side Community Art Center where she was featured artist for Chicago Artist Month, opening to strong reviews and taking history as the first exhibition of its kind in the space.   She has performed or exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Hyde Park Art Center, the Vic Theater, the Historic Y Hall in Tucson Arizona, and The Art Institute of Chicago. Awards include a 2009 3Arts Visual Artist Award Nomination, 2008 Columbia College mini-grant, 2007 Performance Network INCUBATION! Nominee, 2007 MFA Fellowship Award, and 2001 Mellon Research Fellowship.  She is an ongoing lecturer and presenter at conferences and Universities nationwide exploring feminism and anti-oppression, Black diasporic critical thought, and contemporary art practices.  Ni’Ja Whitson is currently teaching at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, The Dance Center at Columbia College and Chicago State University. Photograph by Indian Summer Day (c) 2009