WIP 018 featuring Kirsten Schnittker & Shoji Yamasaki with post-show talk back moderated by Jas Lin.

Shoji Yamasaki
A Visual Encyclopedia of Trash

Shoji Yamasaki is a first-generation Japanese American transdisciplinary creative, born and raised in the unceded ancestral land of Tongva, recently known as Los Angeles, who creates site-responsive and immersive works that explore the history, architecture, and community. His continual desire for expansion as an artist and his experimental ideas has allowed him to take on roles of a choreographer, dancer, performance artist, director, writer, and filmmaker. His recent on-going project, LITTERED MVMNTS, has connected with millions of viewers around the world through social media and has given him opportunities to collaborate with brands such as Paloma Wool, Harper Collective, and H. Lorenzo. He has also been featured in articles such as Hyperallergic and Die Presse. A Visual Encyclopedia of Trash is derived from this project and utilized WIP to explore the live iteration of what has only existed in the digital world.

IG handle: @shojers / @litteredmvmnts
www.shojiyamasaki.com

kirsten schnittker
Substantial Person
Performers:
Laura Bartczak, Frankie Halbiger, Jessica Hemingway

kirsten michelle schnittker is a dancer, choreographer, improviser, arts administrator, and a practitioner of the Feldenkrais Method of Somatic Education. kirsten’s fascination with the sources of behavior in the environment of performance, as well as with the layered hierarchies of choice and action that create a person/performer, inspires the dances they make. In public workshops and invited working groups, most recently hosted by CRAWLSPACE LA, kirsten invites performers to practice their clearing scores: an improvisational awareness and self-direction practice that supports the emergence of artistic voice and more liberated presence. In all kirsten’s work, they seek to increase our sensitivity to the sources and quality of meaning and transformation within us. kirsten’s work has been presented by AUNTS, Brooklyn Arts Exchange, Center for Performance Research, Danspace Project’s Draftwork series, Green Space, The Knockdown Center, Movement Research at The Judson Church, Triskelion Arts, Junior High LA, Vital Joint, FIRST DRAFT, CRAWLSOLO and in various galleries, studios, and parks across LA, NYC, and Zurich.

IG handle: @somatic_autumn
Performer IG handles: @laurawynne, @frankieh456, @germanhemingway
kirstenschnittker.com

What is WIP?

WIP is an artist-led, work-in-progress performance platform co-founded by dance artists Kate Wallich, Stephanie Zaletel, and Belize Wilheim. Launched in 2023, WIP was created to give choreographers and performance makers a “low-tech, high-visibility” space to share evolving works with audiences, fostering curiosity, dialogue, and critical exchange at every stage of development.

The format is simple: each WIP features two artists sharing up to 25 minutes of work-in-progress, followed by a moderated post-show conversation.

WIP’s mission is to provide a supportive and sustainable environment for artists to test new ideas, receive meaningful feedback, and catalyze experimentation within the Los Angeles dance and performance community. By centering progressive and innovative work that challenges convention, WIP strengthens the local ecosystem and deepens connections between artists, arts institutions, and audiences.