We appreciate our teachers here at Mi Chantli, they are some of the nieces, coolest and most talented people that you can find. We hope that you get to learn a lot from them and don’t forget to show support by telling your friends about them.
Kshitija Saturdekar
Kshitija Saturdekar, originally from Mumbai, is a dance educator, artist and
choreographer based in Colorado. She received her Bachelors and Masters of Arts in Sociology from the University of Mumbai, and recently received her Master of Fine Arts in Dance with emphasis in Choreography and secondary emphasis in Hip Hop Studies from the University of Colorado Boulder. Prior to that, she spent ten years teaching students of all ages, choreographing for live events and film, and performing with the Terence Lewis Contemporary Dance Company, a reputed dance company in India. Kshitija has worked and trained under Donna Mejia, Helanius J Wilkins, Rennie Harris, Nii Armah Sowah, Terence Lewis and Bertwin Ravi Dsouza. Kshitija has also performed, choreographed and taught dance in India, Australia, Singapore, Austria, Thailand and USA. During her time at CU Kshitija was also a Graduate Part Time Instructor, a Teaching Assistant and Assistant to the Director of Dance Production for two years which helped her hone her skills in Stage Management, Run Crew and Production Technicalities. Kshitija is passionate about dance education and performance and excited to share her passion with the world.
kshitiijja@gmail.com
Lauren Beale
Ho Bobby Chan
With over 15 years of experience in breaking, Bobby loves keeping it funky fresh on the floor using creative movements to any beat. He started dancing with the CU Boulder Breakin’ Club in 2005. Representing Worm Tank Crew and Blowup Kingz, he strives to become a better dancer through consistent training and keeping an open mind. He loves flowing in the cyphers and getting down in battles. He shares his passion and experience with others as a mentor, instructor, director, performer, and competitor.
bboyho@gmail.com
Larry Southall
Will Walker
Juliet Ayre
Cara Leone
Cara is a mover, mom, physical therapist and so much more with enthusiasm and love for all things movement, nerding out about the human body and having fun!
Originally from the Boston, MA area, Cara has lived in Boulder since 2016, with her husband and 2 children.
She was a competitive gymnast in her earlier years and now dabbles in many different types of movement (mountain biking, climbing, dance, running, strength training, capoeira, etc). She worked in a rehabilitation setting for ~10 years with people with spinal cord injuries, brain injuries, stroke and many other neurological and orthopedic injuries. Since moving to CO she has taken a deep dive into respiratory (breathing) & gait (walking) mechanics and the autonomic nervous system and their role in complex movement and resilience. She is also certified as a postpartum corrective exercise specialist and loves working with all bodies on optimizing how they move and feel in their bodies.
Cara is also an ambassador for Physiology First University, bringing body based education to kids through playful movement to support youth mental health and help them develop skills for resiliency.
She is passionate about people and helping facilitate safety and joy within our own bodies through body awareness, breath, intentional movement and play.
Cara welcomes any and all people to her classes, and truly believes there is no being “good” or “bad” at something, but rather being where you are in YOUR process. Her hope is that people will feel welcome and have fun, while learning about themselves and growing as individuals and a community.
Taino Postigo-Hassin
Kylie Lemonade
As an adult Kylie immersed herself in the club industry and is now a standing member of Hard Candy Dancers. She grew up competing for over a decade in companies across Southern California and Northern Arizona. This allowed her to train in an array of styles that she still uses to this day. Kylie is now inspired by and has worked with many sex workers across Denver making her textures and concepts unique. She has performed venues such as Summit Music Hall, Temple Denver, and Clayton Members Hotel.
Soleil Medina
Peter Morrissey
Gaje Calhoun
Mario Jose Olvera
Mario Jose Olvera’s love and appreciation of art began at the age of 13 when he discovered the craft of lettering. His skill and admiration continued to grow through his involvement with an art warehouse cooperative, experimenting with a plethora of art forms such as painting, music and dance, while exploring the pen, brush, clay and spray can painting. Mario’s artistic lens has become an inseparable part of both his professional and personal life, beautifully woven into his endeavors as an educator, youth mentor, Aztec dancer, and father. Using art as a vessel to foster self acceptance and respect among marginalized populations, Mario has become an influential teacher in the Longmont and Boulder community. He is currently working on the greatest creation of his life, his kids.
MacKenzie Schuller
MacKenzie is a modern dancer based in Boulder, CO. Her dancing is infused with a sense of play, curiosity and wonder. MacKenzie’s embodied practice is shaped primarily by the study of release technique and contact improvisation. While her interests are constantly expanding, she is always playing with the foundational dynamics of effort and ease, finding fluidity in and out of the floor, and moving to the point of exhilaration. She has studied with phenomenal teachers and artists in the SF Bay Area, Portland, OR, Paris, London and NYC. MacKenzie is grateful to have collaborated on and performed in works by Carla Mann and Heidi Duckler, Minh Tran, Iris Erez, Steven Koplowitz, Medhi Farajpour, 11danceco, and Ela Fala Dance Collective.
Jamal “Mal” Johnson
Nicky Schindler
Leah Woods
Leah Woods began studying Middle Eastern dance, as well as West African Guinean, and Flamenco, and Middle Eastern dance as a teen. She continued on to study Ballet and Modern dance in College. She spent 11 years in the Bay Area studying Contemporary and Ballet intensively alongside the many global forms that thrive in that region. She enjoyed an extensive performance career dancing for Loose Change; an Urban Contemporary Dance Company, NAVA Collective and Ballet Afsaneh; Contemporary Central Asian Fusion Companies, Butoh projects with Bad Unkl Sistah, and as a solo Fusion artist. She is a Transnational Fusion dancer nationally, a hybrid form combining Hip Hop, Middle Eastern movement, Contemporary, and Africanist aesthetics. She is a student of Tom Weksler who combines Contemporary dance, Acrobatics, Martial Arts, and Contact Improvisation, as well as a member of Ido Portal’s movement culture movement. She thanks her teachers Liav Memada, Augusta Moore, Sadie Marquardt, Lauren Beale, Marlo Fisken, and Rachel Brice for their tremendous influence on her. She is a certified Gyrokinesis and a Gyrotonics Teacher, a certified Datura Style Transnational Fusion Dance Teacher, and a RYT at the 300 hour level. She received her M.F.A. in Dance and Performance from the University of Colorado, Boulder. She was the first Transnational Fusion MFA candidate at CU Boulder where she received her secondary emphasis in Somatics and a tertiary emphasis in Performance and Culture.
woods.leah@gmail.com
Vivian Kim
Vivian Kim is a Colorado based dance educator, choreographer and performer. Since graduating with her MFA in Dance from the University of Colorado Boulder in May 2018, she has stepped into many positions within the Colorado dance scene, such as: instructing at Denver School of the Arts, Red Rocks Community College, becoming one of three dance curators of the Counterpath Unseen Festival, and doing freelance choreography and masterclasses around the Metropolitan area.
Vivian is a Contemporary-Modern dancer who’s had an extensive career in that field, choreographing, teaching masterclasses, and performing in Minnesota, Ohio, Colorado, Washington, Nebraska, New York and more. In 2017 she began her House and Hip-Hop training with Rennie Harris and his Denver-based company GrassRoots Projects and since then has started training with Dassy Lee (Femme Fatal) and Professor Lock (Hoodlockers). Vivian joined the Block 1750 team in 2020 as an instructor and since has stepped into the role of the Kids All-Styles Program Director.