Leadership Team
Nadia Adame
Artistic Director
Nadia Adame is a Spanish multidisciplinary award-winning artist with a spinal cord injury. She studied Ballet & Flamenco at the Royal Dance Conservatory of Madrid and has a BA in Theatre from the University of Colorado. She was a company member with AXIS (2000-2003) and Candoco Dance Company (2007-2008). In 2004, she co-founded and was the Co-Artistic Director of Compañía Y in Spain, a multimedia and performance collective. Nadia’s credits include dance, theatre, commercial, and independent film projects in the UK, Spain, US, and Canada.
View Team Member - Nadia AdameDanae Rees
Executive Director
Danae brings many years of experience across a variety of dance sectors. Born and raised in Brisbane, Australia, she holds a double Bachelor’s Degree in Performing Arts (Dance) & Education (Secondary) from the Queensland University of Technology. She has provided dance instruction, training and program management to public schools, studios, universities, and dance organizations in Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
View Team Member - Danae ReesAdministrative Team
Octavia Rose Hingle
Accessibility Artist
Octavia Rose Hingle (they/he) is an East Bay born & raised choreographer, performing artist and cultural producer with a physical impairment. Their performance and installation work centers access as an aesthetic portal into visions of past and future ancestors that travel through the present moment. They are the founder and co-producer of Crip Ecstasy, a nightlife event series that centers accessibility and disability culture; conjuring new blueprints for what a club space can be.
View Team Member - Octavia Rose HingleAlannah Martin
Education + Outreach Coordinator
Alannah Martin is a disabled and neurodivergent choreographer, performer, scholar, and arts advocate who has recently transitioned from New York City to the Bay Area to work with AXIS Dance Company. Her creative and academic research focuses on neurodiverse dance and disability justice through performance. Alannah has a BA in Dance and a minor in Disability Studies from the University of Wyoming and an MFA in Dance from Sarah Lawrence College. Her performance works include repertory by Paul Taylor, Netta Yerushalmy, Molly Lieber and Eleanor Smith, Jordan Demetrius Llloyd, Cat Kamrath-Monson, and Marsha Faye Knight.
View Team Member - Alannah MartinArtistic Team
JanpiStar
Company Dancer
JanpiStar (they/them/Janpi) was born and raised in Puerto Rico. They got involved with art for the first time through the music at the Fine Art School Anita Toro Hernández as a 12-year-old playing the clarinet. In 2012 Janpi began their Bachelor Degree in Drama at the University of Puerto Rico Rio Piedras and had the opportunity to work with Viveca Vazquez, Carola Garcia and Petra Bravo.
View Team Member - JanpiStarAlaja Badalich
Company Dancer
Native to Eugene, Oregon, A(laj) Badalich (she/they) trained at Oregon Ballet Academy and University of North Carolina School of the Art’s modern high school program. In 2018, she began her dance studies in San Francisco at the Alonzo King LINES Ballet Training Program under the direction of Karah Abiog.
View Team Member - Alaja BadalichJulie Hasushi
Company Dancer
Julie Hasushi is dancer, actress and publicist from São Paulo, Brazil. She started dancing at the age of 9 with the dance company Arte Sem Barreiras, and then danced with Bombelela Dance Company for over 20 years. At Bombelela, she received an award for Revelation Artist, and participated in major events including: A Tour of the Paralympic Torch at the 2016 games in Rio de Janeiro, and representing Brazil at SIDF (Sibu International Dance Festival) in Malaysia.
View Team Member - Julie HasushiAnna Gichan
Company Dancer
Anna Gichan (she/her) is a Deaf contemporary dancer from NJ with a background in gymnastics, yoga and circus. She received her BFA in Dance from Rutgers University Mason Gross School of the Arts.
View Team Member - Anna Gichan
Aliya Kerimujiang
Apprentice Dancer
Aliya, of Uyghur descent, was born in Urumqi, China. She holds a B.A. in Dance Education from Minzu University of China, an M.A. in Teaching Dance in the Professions from NYU Steinhardt, and an M.F.A. in Dance from UC Irvine. Her research, Ecological Performance Practice, explores movement interconnectivity through empathy, imagination, and the animal body.
View Team Member - Aliya KerimujiangJoseph Tebandeke
Company Dancer
Tebandeke is a contemporary dancer and choreographer from Kampala, Uganda. His work stretches the idea of dance, going into contemporary art and sculptures. Tebandeke’s work involve other arts practices but also communicates in addressing urgent social challenges, mainly dominant ideas around ability. Tebandeke use his body to create his own dictionary of ability and he has been developing a physical practice that encompasses different local and global dance traditions and movement practices. Joseph is a performer in sectors and in societies that systematically marginalizes “disabled” people. His works create a notion and a movement that will re-label “disability”. his committed to decolonize dance as a language that all can access and that benefits from diversity, through his aesthetic expression and developing personal self-esteem that helped him question the intersection of the world where the concept of being able or disabled meet.
View Team Member - Joseph Tebandeke
Hannah Westbrook
Company Dancer
Hannah Westbrook (she/her) is a queer, white, dance artist and educator, raised on the land of the Cahuilla people (Hemet, California). Her interests lie in the ever shifting web of dance, theater, improvisational practice, and site-specific dance. Hannah is a graduate of UC Berkeley, earning the Departmental Citation for excellence in dance. As a choreographer, her work for stage and film has been supported by FACT/SF, Art Farm, SAFEhouse Arts, and showcased in film festivals across the US and abroad. Dancing with AXIS Dance Company has been a lifelong dream since first being exposed to the company while studying dance as a teen at Mt. San Jacinto College, and she is honored and thrilled to take on this role as company dancer. Hannah has previously had the pleasure of working with many incredible artists including Lizz Roman + Dancers, Ciarra D’Onofrio + Dancers, Epiphany Dance Theater, Tim Rubel Human Shakes, animi motus, Tara Pilbrow Dance, and an ensemble role in Anna Halprin’s Parades and Changes.
View Team Member - Hannah Westbrook