Participants will spend time making Miya's self-portrait origami, a playful printing of her face that we will fold into traditional origami designs, such as the jumping frog, butterfly, paku paku and cube.
The origami sculptures will then be used in an improvised movement practice led by Shion, inspired by the paper designs, folding and unfolding the body, and connecting with one another.
This workshop is open level (no previous origami or dance experience required) and suited to all ages; for younger children, assistance from an adult is required.
Featured Artists
Shion Skye Carter · Choreographer | Performer
Shion Skye Carter (they/she) is a dance artist originally from Gifu, Japan, based in Vancouver, BC on the unceded, traditional lands of the Coast Salish peoples. Through a movement language of sensitive intensity, hybridizing choreography with heritage forms like calligraphy, and interweaving materiality into performance, Shion’s artistic practice peels apart layers of identity and reflects on the complex human experience. Recent presentations of their work include VIDF (BC), Tangente (QC), Live Art Dance (NS), Art Gallery of Ontario (ON), b12 free radicals (Berlin), and L’AiR Arts Atelier 11 (Paris), and they perform with dance companies Action at a Distance/Vanessa Goodman, Furious Grace Dance Theatre/Anya Saugstad, Odd Meridian Arts/Ziyian Kwan, and Wen Wei Dance. Shion's choreography has been recognized through the Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award (2021), the Chrystal Dance Prize (2023), and most recently, their solo Cobalt was shortlisted for the Bloom International Dance Prize at Sadler’s Wells, London, UK (2027 edition).
Miya Turnbull · Choreographer | Performer | Mask Creator
Miya Turnbull (she/her) is a multidisciplinary visual artist based in Kjipuktuk (Halifax, NS), originally from Alberta. Working across sculpture, photography, video and performance, her practice is rooted in mask-making. She is best known for her ongoing series of Photo-Masks; life-like self-portraits that are altered and reconfigured to explore identity, persona and cultural hybridity as mixed Japanese Canadian. Miya holds a BFA from the University of Lethbridge, and her art has been exhibited across Canada, the US, Europe and Asia. Her work has been featured in Visual Arts News, Art Reveal (Germany), and Vogue Thailand, and she has collaborated with dance artists such as Shion Skye Carter and Emiko Agatsuma, performing with her masks in Halifax, Montréal, Toronto and Vancouver. Her masks also appeared in the short film Nô Feminist, which premiered at Cannes (2022). In 2025, Miya was long-listed for the Sobey Art Award.