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Guest Artists
Please meet our lovely and talented dancers for our first 2024-2025 concert performance.
Mark Gonzalez
Guest Artist
Mark Gonzalez is a dance artist from Edinburg, Texas. He received a BFA in Dance with emphasis in Performance and Choreography and a minor in Theatre from Texas State University. After leaving Texas, Mark trained and performed with The Dayton Contemporary Dance Company 2 under the direction of Shonna Matlock. He was a scholarship recipient for Giordano Dance Chicago and Flockworks. After moving to Chicago, Mark Apprenticed with Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre. Mark is currently a Chicago based freelance artist with AJA Talent and C5 Create with No Limits. He is also a Company Artist with Identity Performing Arts and Still Inspired. Recently, Mark was selected to participate in Flockworks creation intensive at Orsolina28 in Moncalvo, Italy.
Outside of performing, Mark has had the privilege to present his own choreography regionally, nationally and internationally at festivals including but not limited to COCO Dance Festival (Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago), Detroit Dance City Festival (Detroit, MI), Koresh Artist Showcase (Philadelphia, PA), And BarnStorm Dance Festival (Houston, TX). Recently, Mark was selected as a choreographer for New Dances 2024, a partnership with DanceWorks Chicago and Thodos Dance Chicago. Mark is a firm believer in the power of passion and hard work.
Meg Gourley
visting Guest Artist
Meg Gourley is a graduate of the University of Georgia with her BFA in Dance and a minor in Anthropology with a K12 Certification for Dance. As a professional dance artist, she has worked with independent artists Patsy Collins, Leo Briggs, and Monica Hogan Danceworks on evening length productions. Currently, Meg is in her sixth season as a company member of Kit Modus premiering new works by Jillian Mitchell, Mark Caserta, Pulkit Sharma, Ruben Julliard, Alexander Espinosa, Maddie Hanson, and Yoshito Sakuraba. As a choreographer, Meg has collaborated with Catherine Messina to create three new works, being presented in Atlanta, Philadelphia, and New York. Her collaborative work with Andre Lumpkin and Jordan Young entitled "Tethered Together" was performed at Underground Atlanta and in Fly On A Wall's Excuse The Art. Meg has been commissioned as a choreographer by Agnes Scott College, Dekalb Symphony Orchestra, Oconee Performing Arts Society, Peach State Opera, and Gwinnett County Public Schools. She is a dance educator in the Atlanta area, serves as guest faculty for The Joffrey Ballet School, University of Georgia, and Agnes Scott College. Meg is currently in her first year as an MFA Candidate at University of Wisconsin- Milwaukee, and her research explores the intersection of historical narratives and embodied experience through a feminist lens.
Nik Graves
Guest Artist
Nik Graves (they/he) graduated from Columbia College Chicago with a BA in Dance. Nik co-founded We Are Collective with a focus on queer inclusivity. They have performed with Reign Drop at Synapse’s New Works for I Am. They performed Robin Davis’s STRANGEBIRD at Khecari and at Dovetail. He choreographed & performed CRUDE at EXPO Chicago 2023. Nik’s work, Vex [Extended Cut], debuted at Alluvion’s arrive festival. Nik also worked with We Are Collective in the company’s first three seasons. The Things You Showed Me, a work dedicated to their grandfather, was performed as part of Pink Slip Zine in 2024 and will be presented at Delve in 2025. Recently their works, Orogeny Unfolds & Crown Shyness debuted at Wave Wall by See Chicago Dance. A new work, Rumination Room, was selected by Chicago DanzTheatre Ensemble to be performed in 2024. They are excited to debut The Bearded Couple as part of Still Inspired’s Future Artists 2025. Nik’s work mainly focuses on queerness, threads of nature, with a throughline of grotesque qualities.
hannah huang
Guest Artist
Hannah Huang (they/she) found dance in their hometown Davis, California before following their passion for movement to Salt Lake City, Utah where they earned their BFA in Ballet with a minor in modern dance. She has performed choreography by Gregory Dawson, Alejandro Cerrudo, Penny Saunders, and Jennifer Archibald. Hannah now works in Chicago as a freelance dancemaker, performing with others and presenting their own creative work. As an artist, Hannah is curious about vulnerability and softness, abandonment and vigor, and everything in between. When they aren't in the studio, you might find them at a sewing machine or eating something tasty.
Audrey Hartnett
Guest Artist
Audrey Hartnett (she/they) is a Chicago based artist with passions for dance performance and writing. She is currently a company member with Identity Performing Arts, Meher Dance Company, and We Are Collective as well as a seasonal artist with 773 Dance Project and Meadows Dance Collective. She also helps run administration for Meadows Dance Collective, We Are Collective, and The Space Movement Project with goals to make dance accessible and inclusive for audiences and artists alike.
Francisco (Franky) Melendez
Guest Artist
Francisco (Franky) Melendez is an apprentice with the Chicago Repertory Ballet and has been with the company since 2022. Originally from El Paso, TX, he is a former company dancer with Human Nature Contemporary Ballet and the El Paso Ballet Theatre. He moved to Chicago in 2019, and since then has received training from the Ruth Page Center For The Arts, Joel Hall Dancers & Center, and from the Chicago Movement Collective as a Claire Bataille Legacy Program student.
brady neher
Guest Artist
Brady Neher (he/they) is from Milan, OH where he grew up training in gymnastics and several forms of dance before beginning his professional training. He then went on to Chicago, IL where he is currently based to receive his BFA in Dance from Columbia College Chicago. He has danced as a company member of We Are Collective for two years and is a current member of Meher Dance Team. He uses his modern training and background in gymnastics together to create a movement style that explores torque and balance in unconventional ways.
Elisabeth Roskopf 이지영
visting Guest Artist
Born in South Korea and raised in Appleton, Wisconsin, Elisabeth Roskopf 이지영 is a dancer, performer, choreographer, educator, pianist, and a mother to her daughter, Alina. She is a company member of Li Chiao-Ping Dance, Danceworks Performance MKE, the Gina Laurenzi Dance Project, and a performance/choreography collaborator with Wild Space Dance Company. Elisabeth is currently earning her Master of Fine Arts in Dance at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) where she is honored to be a recipient of the Graduate Student Excellence Fellowship award. She co-produced and performed in “Provenance: A Letter to My Daughter”, an award-winning screendance work created with director/choreographer Li Chiao-Ping and cinematographer/editor Christal Wagner. Elisabeth is the Founder and Creative Director of Dance For Diversity, an annual screendance project that is made explicitly for Artists of Color to share their voices and stories of identity through their dance-making and performance work. As a Korean American Dance Artist, Elisabeth’s choreographic work and embodied dance scholarship create a platform for Adoptees and BIPOC Dance Artists to have a place to be visible in the fullness of their identity and authenticity while fostering a sense of belonging permanently.
