Erika Chong Shuch is an American theatrical performer, director, choreographer, and educator based in San Francisco, California. Her work has appeared on stages in the San Francisco Bay Area, Washington, DC, and Seoul, South Korea.
Among many awards, she received a 2014 Investing in Artists Award from the Center for Cultural Innovation,[1] a 2008 Honorary Fellowship from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation,[2] and a 2007 Dance USA Award from the Irvine Foundation[3] She received the 2003 Goldie Award for artistic achievement in dance from the San Francisco Bay Guardian, which called her "among the leaders in the field",[4] and her show "One Window" was cited by the SF Weekly as one of the Top Ten Theater Events of 2005.[citation needed] She has been nominated for three Isadora Duncan Awards,[5][6] dedicated to outstanding achievement among Bay Area dance artists.
Shuch has choreographed (and appeared in) plays staged by the California Shakespeare Theater regularly since 2009.[7] Of the troupe's 2014 production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream," in which Shuch directed the movement and played the role of Titania, the San Jose Mercury News said, "Shuch's hypnotic movement is at the heart of this giddy and memorable 'Dream.'"[8]
Reviewing Orbit, the San Francisco Chronicle noted: "What makes Erika Shuch's work so arresting isn't the way she intuitively melds movement and theater, or the knack she has for attracting brilliant collaborators, or the Gen Y appeal of her slouchy, all-too-human performers. What's made this still-young choreographer a standout since she emerged in San Francisco six years ago is her childlike audacity in the face of big questions. Shuch is a maker of metaphors, an existential explorer whose characters consider their place in the galaxy through poetic symbols."[9]
Television station KQED documented Shuch's creative process in a May 2007, edition of its show SPARK.[10]
Shuch began performing as a theater student at UC Santa Cruz under dancer/choreographer Mel Wong. There, she attended a workshop by the politically charged performance group Contraband, which suggested a broader framework for Wong's methods. She cites as influences Wong, Contraband, filmmaker and writer Miranda July, and the NPR radio show This American Life.[11]
Her first troupe was known as the Beauty School. She disbanded that group and formed the Erika Shuch Performance Project (ESP Project) in 2002. "Through metaphor and theatrical alchemy," the company, according to its website, seeks to provide "a mirror, a lens, an opportunity for reflection, a brainstorm, a meetingplace, a prayer, a conversation, and a confession."[12] ESP Project has gone on to perform at many San Francisco Bay Area venues, including a long-running residency at Intersection For The Arts.[13]
As co-founder of the Experimental Performance Institute at San Francisco's New College of California, Shuch co-directed BA and MFA performance programs during the school's initial years.[citation needed] She joined the adjunct faculty at California College of the Arts in 2014[14] and lectured to UC Berkeley's Global Urban Humanities Initiative in 2015.[15]
In addition to her own productions, she has directed, choreographed, or appeared in works by Richard Montoya, Peter Brook, Eric Ehn, Sean San Jose, Octavio Solis, Philip Kan Gotanda, and Daniel Handler (a.k.a. Lemony Snicket).[16]
Shuch has held residencies at the Berkeley Reportory Theater (2012), American Conservatory Theater (2012), San Diego State University (2012), Mullae Art Space, Seoul, Korea (2011), deYoung Museum (2010), Naropa University (2010), American Conservatory Theater (2009-2012), and UC Berkeley (2007-2010). Other residencies include the Headlands Center for the Arts (2006),[17] Djerassi (2007),[citation needed] ODC Theatre (2003, 2004),[18] and Intersection for the Arts (2003–present).[19]
Shuch is a member of Choreographers in Mentorship Exchange, a program of the Margaret Jenkins Dance Company, under the mentorship of choreographer Joe Goode.[citation needed]