Leila Awadallah
Minneapolis, MN
Dance
Leila Awadallah is a dancer, choreographer and film wanderer based primarily in Minneapolis, Mni Sota Makoce and sometimes Beirut, Lebanon. Dancing with a body that activates roots which tether her firmly to Palestine and softly to Sicily, born on Turtle Island on Dakota | Lakota lands (South Dakota), and living in the Midwest as an Arab American with mixed Mediterranean ways and waves. She is the Co-Artistic Director of Body Watani Dance along with her sister Noelle Awadallah.
Body Watani Dance is a project both specific and spacious – a container to research the notion of ‘home/land’ in the body. The research in process and practice activates by digging into embodied memories somatically, improvisationally, and aesthetically to contemplate present and future relation to place; land, waters, nation, migration, diaspora, displacement, settler colonial violences, indigenous aliveness. The work holds a particular lens towards occupied and indigenous Palestinian homelands while grappling with diasporic distance. As displaced daughters of the destroyed village: Ras Abu Ammar with refugee grandparents that fled to Beit Jala, Palestinian, exile, migration, and roots are grappled with in both urgent bursts and sustained, long-term commitment.
Body Watani’s first evening-length company ensemble work Terranea: Hakawatia of the Sea consisted of a multiyear process developed across multiple locations in the Midwest and the Mediterranean region. Terranea weaves a contemporary mythology about Terranea, a sea spirit who gathers those that have lost their lives in the Mediterranean. It was performed in 2022 and 2023 in Lebanon, Chicago, Dearborn and Minneapolis with support from the (US): National Performance Network, Jerome Foundation, Minnesota State Arts Board, Arab American National Museum, Links Hall, (LB):Goethe-Institute, Hammana Artist House, and Amalgam. In addition, Leila’s solo YISSH (created in 2019) has been performed in festivals in Lebanon (2019), Egypt (2022), Palestine (2023), and multiple venues and community spaces in Minnesota.
Leila is a McKnight Dancer (2022), Jerome Hill (2021), Daring Dances (2019) and Springboard for the Arts (2018) Fellow. She received the Next Step (2023) and Jerome Travel (2018) grants to collaborate and research in Palestine. Leila is a co-founder of the trio: Kelvin Wailey (MN), a collaborator of the Theater of the Women of the Camp (Lebanon), and more recently Amwaj Choir and Diyar Dance (Palestine). Leila danced with Ananya Dance Theater | ADT for 6 seasons (2014-2019). During this time she was deeply trained in Yorchha and mentored in impactful ways by Ananya Chatterje in addition to performing and teaching across the US with ADT and in festivals in Ethiopia, India, and Palestine. Leila has a BFA in Dance and a minor in Arabic Language & Literature from the U of M.
In her free time, Leila finds joy in practicing Tai Chi and Aikido, swimming and walking near bodies of water, and singing kareoke with more passion than skill.
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