Kelsey Paschich is a multidisciplinary dance artist originally from Albuquerque, New Mexico. She is an Assistant Professor of Innovation in Dance at Western Michigan University and currently based in Kalamazoo, MI. She experiments with and creates live + digital work that explores the moving body and its relationship to technology. She uses movement as a language that makes transparent the space between dream + reality with spontaneity, juxtaposition, the element of surprise and challenges the preconceived understanding of real versus surreal. Her work often utilizes multi-media elements inspired by surrealism as the theoretical + conceptual framework. She views dance as a medium that can embolden change for a better world. She is the Founder + Artistic Director of phygital dance lab as an incubator for the experimentation and creation of dance integrated with technology. 

 

Paschich holds an MFA in Dance from the University of New Mexico and a BFA (Cum Laude) from Point Park University. Paschich is 1 of 12 certified teachers in the U.S. and 1 of 44 globally. Paschich received her Countertechnique® Teacher Certification in Melbourne, Australia, with founder Anouk van Dijk, in 2016.

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Her choreographic and multidisciplinary work investigates the phygital (physical and digital space), humanness, the moving body, and its relationship to technology through: screendance, dance for film, choreographic installations, and emerging technologies. Most recently she has been experimenting and developing work with motion capture technology in collaboration with interactive media specialist, Kevin Abbott. Her digital work has been screened in Istanbul, Lisbon, Ulm, Denver, Michigan, and across the United States. Paschich is the recipient of the WMU Presidential Innovation Professorship 2023, Distant Digital Dance Maker commission for Tanz mit dem Tiger 2021 (Ulm, Germany), Creative Living for Dancers Award 2021 (Brussels, Belgium), the Dancing Lab Residency at the National Center for Choreography at the University of Akron (NCCAkron) 2021, and was the recipient of the National Dizzy Feet Foundation Gene Kelly Legacy Scholarship in 2016. She has been an invited presenter at conferences in Indonesia, The Netherlands, South Korea, and Hawaii. 

 

Paschich has has performed extensively with: The Moscow State Classical Ballet, DCDC2, Thodos Dance Chicago, River North Chicago Dance Company , the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Interdansa Dance Festival 2010, Keshet Dance Company, ARCOS Dance, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and Lawine Torrèn (Dance Theatre Machines Media) in the Hannibal Project in Sölden, Austria. She has performed the repertory of choreographers: Robert Battle, José Limón, Ann Reinking, Lucas Crandall, Lar Lubavitch, Tamir Ginz, Margo Sappington, Johan Renvall, Kevin O’ Day, Alan Heinline, Joanie Smith, Frank Chavez, Melissa Thodos, Zac Whittenburg, Curtis Uhlemann, Robert Moses, Gail Gilbert, Donna Jewell, Erika Pujic, Lawine Torrèn, Tomaz Simatovic, and others. Paschich’s professional experience, informs her pedagogical methodology in providing a progressive and holistic education to cultivate the next generation of artists.

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