Founded in 2010 by Merli V. Guerra and Kimberleigh A. Holman in Boston, Luminarium Dance Company is an award-winning contemporary dance company regularly hailed for its unique combination of dance and light. The company has performed its repertory at over 80 events across the country, as well as abroad in Romania, Italy, Germany, and Canada.
Earlier this year, Luminarium Artistic Director Merli V. Guerra was invited to guest choreograph a new work for Rider University’s spring concert, focused on human consumption and environmental sustainability. The new work (now set on Luminarium’s professional Boston-based company, and titled “8.7 million minus 1”) integrates classical Odissi Indian dance, modern, and shadow theatre to literally and metaphorically illuminate the effects of human waste and pollution on the planet’s ecosystems. Incorporating found sound and spoken poetry by Guerra, the work aims to remind each of us of our direct impacts on the problem, and the habits we can change in our daily routines to do our part.
