Today we’d like to introduce you to Sofia Saenz, Grigori Arakelyan, Sophia Moritz, & Jacob Robleto.
Hi Sofia, Grigori, Sophia, & Jacob, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start, maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers.
All four of us founders at ChoCoLA (Choreographer Collection Los Angeles) have had an absolute blast on our journey of creating our choreographer/dance collective. We are a group of really great friends who all have our own relationship with dance and the LA dance community, and each of us felt that there could be more opportunities to create, dance, and connect with fellow artists in the greater Los Angeles area. In the early Spring of 2023, we came together and decided that we wanted to build a supportive community of choreographers, dancers, and dance lovers and provide them with more opportunities to encourage dance-makers to create and connect. For our initial launch into the LA dance community, we hosted a showcase for choreographers to present new or returning works and hosted a workshop for the presenting choreographers to test run their creations to fellow dance-makers, where they had the chance to ask any questions, they felt need answered and constructive feedback. For our first-ever showcase, we received an incredible response from the participating choreographers and dancers as well as from our audience. The overall response really started our engines, and we are now in the process of providing many more spaces for choreographers to present works and expand dance into all corners of Los Angeles.
We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
It has been a surprisingly smooth road for us to get to where we are today and our goal to encourage choreographers to create and connect has helped push past the few obstacles we have had to face. One of our biggest obstacles has been figuring out where exactly we fit in the LA dance community. Many people will look around LA and see dance companies, incredible college dance departments, and other collectives that are similar to our own and ask why do we need another one. Our answer to this has been, why not another one? We believe that there should be many opportunities for choreographers to create and present works. There are often lots of opportunities to dance but not many to create. We also have found from talking to each other and fellow choreographers that the LA dance world can make you feel incredibly alone, which is why for all of our events, there is at least one networking opportunity where we can turn to everyone and really encourage them to connect with each other and stay in touch. Another challenge we face are the finances, like so many other art institutions face in this world. Our dreams are big, but for just starting out, our finances are not, and it can be hard to fit our dreams into our budget’s reality. However, we work with our nonprofit fiscal sponsor, ArtistsPlus Productions, and believe with time, we can make our bigger goals into a reality.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
We are two big things at ChoCoLA. First, we provide different platforms for choreographers to showcase and workshop their work, be it new work or returning. We strive to build an encouraging space for dance-makers to leap into their creative process and continue pushing the definition of what dance and choreography means. Second, we are here to build a strong collective of artists who all share a love for dance and movement. Our community is open to anyone who loves, creates, lives, and breathes the dance art form.
We are extremely proud of the connections we have already built through our organization with only having launched this past year. Just from our first showcase, each of us founders has formed relationships with fellow choreographers and dancers in the LA area that have led to friendships and professional collaborations. The best feeling has been walking into a different dance setting that isn’t one of our own, seeing someone we met from our showcase, and instantly jumping into exciting conversation about life and dance like we have all known each other for a lifetime. We are also proud of the work we see presented by the choreographers who have all been itching to get their brains and bodies creating again. It all really invigorates us to keep thinking, “What is next for ChoCoLA?”
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
All four of us at ChoCoLA have very different takes on risk, but where we all agreed was the risk to start this venture. Risk is an uncomfortable necessity when starting something from the ground up, and we will only know our limits by testing them. As soon as we launched our organization and the idea stopped being theoretical, we had a brand and identity to uphold, with people counting on us. That in itself takes risk, but it has also been so rewarding seeing how it all has paid off.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.chocolosangeles.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cho.co.la_?igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61551825192666&mibextid=eQY6cl
Image Credits
Hannah Doerr
Melissa O’Gara
ChoCoLA
