Team Group: Teaching Artists

Matthew Cumbie (he/him/his) is a collaborative dancemaker, writer, and artist educator. His artistic research cultivates processes and experiences that are participatory and intergenerational, moving through known and unknown, and bring a poetic lens to a specifically queer experience. His choreography and dancemaking- considered “a blend of risk-taking with reliability, [and] a combination of uncertainty and wisdom,”- weaves together a physical vocabulary of momentum and clarity, revelatory moments, and a belief in a body’s capacity to meet each moment.

He has danced in the companies of Christian von Howard, Keith Thompson, Jill Sigman, Paloma McGregor, and Dance Exchange- an intergenerational dance organization founded by Liz Lerman- where he became an Associate Artistic Director and the Director of Programs and Communications. With Dance Exchange, he collaborated on and performed in works ranging in topic from the human genome to prayer and protest, on the highest point of the Great Smoky Mountains during a total solar eclipse, and with community organizers and activists after years of research and work in response to structures of racism and erasure in Dallas, Texas. In partnership with Dance Exchange, Matthew advanced his body of work Growing Our Own Gardens- an iterative intergenerational performance project rooted in queer world-making that partners with local LGBTQ+ and arts organizations, like the Rainbow History Project, the DC Center, and Dance Place, to catalyze intergenerational LGBTQ+ convenings and reflection. 

As an artist educator, Matthew helped develop and brand Cassie Meador’s Moving Field Guide: a program created in partnership with the US Forest Service that connects artists with scientists, naturalists, and environmental educators to help people learn about environmental issues. He has been an artist-educator with Jacob’s Pillow, including their Curriculum in Motion program, and continues integrating artistic approaches and facilitation strategies in classrooms and with teachers in PG County (Maryland) and Waterville, ME. He has been on faculty at Texas Woman’s University, Queensborough Community College, American University, and the Peabody Conservatory at Johns Hopkins University, and has been an invited speaker at the New York City Roundtable Arts in Education conference, the Advancing the Human Condition Symposium at Virginia Tech, and the LGBT Health and Art Making conference, in partnership with the Human Rights Commission and the GWU Health and Well-being graduate program. He was also selected to be a part of the inaugural APAP Artist Leadership Fellowship cohort.

Currently, he is a Visiting Assistant Professor at Colby College. He continues creating work independently and in collaboration with Betsy Miller, Tom Truss, and Annie Kloppenberg, and as a company member with Christopher K. Morgan & Artists. He supports the development of artists’ work as a professional fundraiser, specializing in online fundraising campaigns and grant writing, and is a certified practitioner of Liz Lerman’s Critical Response Process. His work has been commissioned and supported by places like Dance Place, the Kennedy Center, Herman Melville’s Arrowhead, and Harvard University, and by the National Endowment for the Arts, the DC Commission for the Arts and Humanities, HumanitiesDC, the Arcus Foundation, the New England Foundation for the Arts, and the Somerville Arts Council. Originally from Houston, Matthew holds undergraduate degrees from Texas Lutheran University and Texas State University and an MFA in dance from Texas Woman’s University.

Joanne is a graduate of the University of Colorado – Boulder, College of Music. She holds a Bachelor’s of Music with high honors, with concentration in Voice Performance and Theater Arts.  She has participated in numerous camps, workshops, and classes with master teachers from Zimbabwe, Congo, Ghana, Guinea, Senegal, Cuba, and Haiti studying song, drumming, and dance. In addition, Joanne attended the Blue Tribe School of Music and Dance in Albuquerque, NM from 2001-04. There she studied West African and Zimbabwean dance, drumming, and song. Ultimately she became the lead singer for the Blue Tribe, and a drummer for the dance classes and performances, while also working as a percussion accompanist for African and Modern dance classes at the University of New Mexico. Her performance experience is extensive. Joanne has crisscrossed the United States as a percussionist and a singer/songwriter playing venues ranging from 20 seat coffee shops to folk festivals attended by thousands. She was the lead accompanist for Kim Waterman as well as a drum teacher at The Berkshire Pulse from 2006 – 2015,  and she’s thrilled to be back for this series of classes.

LUANA DIAS DAVID – PROFESSIONAL DANCER AND CHOREOGRAPHER
“It is immensely rewarding to help others achieve a happy and healthy lifestyle.”
Luana began her professional career at the age of 14 in Brazil. She has done dance performances/choreographer throughout Italy, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Germany, U.S.A., Mexico, Israel, Russia, Turkey, South Korea, China, Kazakhstan, Romanian, Armenia, Georgia. Recently back from her first South America tour with Zumba events including Colombia, Peru, Chile and Brazil!
A native of Sao Paulo-Brazil, Luana was exposed to a mixed culture of Break dance, Samba, Capoeira and classic Ballet which have inspired her dance philosophy and style. 

Tarcísio is a Brazilian artist living in the Berkshires. His interdisciplinary approach to the arts gives him the ability to navigate through different art forms. He is a member of the brazilian percussion group Berkshire Bateria, and the bossa nova band Bossa Triba. He performs often with both groups. He has published two books, a poetry book called “Point of Departure”, and a children’s book titled “Quinho, a Kid Out The World”. Tarcisio has worked in Upstate New York at the Art Omi teaching theater. Presently he works for ONG, also in Upstate NY providing individuals with autism with artistic and practical avenues to live life and to self-express. Out of all art forms that he practices, he has practiced capoeira the longest. Capoeira was part of his upbringing in Brazil and he started it at the age of 10. He is excited to share it with the Berkshires.

Melissa Elstein founded Good Energy Movement & Wellness to bring the joy of movement to students of all ages and levels in her dance and yoga classes.  As a young dancer, she trained at Balanchine’s School of American Ballet and performed with NYCB, Berlin Opera Ballet, and Royal Danish Ballet. Her teachers at SAB included Stanley Williams, Madame Danilova, and Suki Schurer.  During Summer breaks, Melissa studied at Ballet West, and in NYC with Melissa Hayden, Willie Burmann, Madame Darvash, and David Howard (where she became a scholarship student).  She was accepted into the Pennsylvania Ballet Company her last year of high school. Melissa performed with that company for several years until an injury sidelined her professional ballet career. 

Shifting to academics, Melissa graduated from Barnard College and Columbia Law School. She completed Federal clerkships, before joining NYPD’s legal bureau. Her life took another turn when she trained in yoga, qigong, Pilates, Reiki, and other healing modalities. Returning to her first passion (ballet), Melissa graduated from Finis Jhung’s teacher training, performed in three of his instructional DVDs, and taught adult ballet for him at Alvin Ailey’s Extension Program. She completed children’s teacher trainings with Yogi Beans and American Ballet Theater and has taught children’s and teen ballet at the School at Steps on Broadway and as a guest teacher in the Berkshires. 

Her website:  www.Melissa-Mati.com.

Ashley Hartka received her dance degrees from SUNY Purchase (BALA, 1995) and the University of Colorado at Boulder (MFA, 2005). Ashley found her passion for teaching early on with Flowering Child long before it became Berkshire Pulse. She has since taught dance in multiple ways to a wide variety of populations, from teaching college students at the University of Colorado and at SUNY Albany; lower school students in NYC public schools; technique classes to many age groups in various local programs and studios; and movement exploration classes to teens and adults in community settings, both indoors and out.

Ashley greatly enjoys the choreographic process, movement exploration, improvisation, and the art of movement in the everyday. She has been choreographing and performing in her own work and has had the privilege to perform in works by great artists such as Trisha Brown, Martha Graham, Kevin Wynn, Michelle Ellsworth and Gabe Masson, Sondra Loring, Sarah Stackhouse, among many others. She has been a member of a dance collective that performed many site-specific and cross collaborative works. Additionally, she has been involved in a movement lab, a Contemplative Dance Practice and an improvisational group with wonderful movement artists. Ashley is thrilled to be sharing her love of dance to her young students again this year.