OPEN STUDIOS | Curated by Ty Defoe

Ty Defoe brings together Indigenous women/ non-binary artists across three generations in a space for making, remembering, and becoming.

Ty Defoe brings together Dawn Avery, Jolie Cloutier, and Jessica Ranville, Indigenous women/non-binary artists across three generations in a shared space for making, remembering, and becoming. In honor of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives (MMIR) week, the work centers presence over erasure—asking how Indigenous fem bodies carry knowledge, resist patriarchy, and practice survival through art. The evening presents a living conversation across time, where lineage is not inherited alone, but enacted in relation.

PROGRAM

Dawn Avery: Where is she?

In honor of MMIWG and their families

Composed by Dawn Ieri’hó:kwats Avery with participants. Directed by Ty Defoe

In this work, I am experimenting with intentionality in and of the land, space, change, connection, relationship, language, gratitude, blessings, remembrance, and condolence gifted in the form of performance art with video design by a woman of great intention, Kate Freer. 

With a focus on Native Indigenous people and their language, it is inclusive to any participant who has a grandmother, mother, sister, woman, or auntie.

Women in the matrilineal, Haudenosaunee society and in many Indigenous nations, are honored as caregivers, caretakers, historians, clan mothers and leaders in governance, sacred keepers of moon and healing ceremonies, and medicine keepers. The respect is great. 

Where Is She?  honors the lives and families of the Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG) and is dedicated to those working to end this epidemic that has continued on Turtle Island for decades. A special thank you to CPR and curator, Ty Defoe for their continued work in bringing this to people’s attention.

Jolie Cloutier: Tomato Season

Tomato Season, written and performed by Jolie Cloutier, a member of Onondaga Nation's Wolf Clan, is the story of a young Native American woman navigating the complexities and possibilities of pregnancy in the contemporary United States, and the powerful possibility of bringing a life into today's  world. The piece explores themes of generational trauma, religious trauma, motherhood, abortion, and the realization of not being ready for something you've always wanted. Cloutier tackles a heavy societal topic and presents it to the audience from an Indigenous lens, and tells a daunting story with hope, honesty, and self grace. Tomato Season is Cloutier's first writing project to be presented in front of an audience. Jolie is extremely grateful to share this story, and she would like to thank Ty Defoe, the folks at CPR, her partner Andrew, her friends who listened to her from the start, and her instructors at HB studio for encouraging her to tell her story.

Jessica Ranville: Martha in Space

This is a work-in-progress excerpt of a one-act play with music, featuring puppetry, projections and choreography. It follows the story of Martha, a journalist unmoored by grief, on assignment in outer space. There she encounters Mo, a war photographer-cum-astrophotographer on a personal mission of his own. Encouraging, cajoling, undermining and inspiring Martha is a Greek Chorus—at times her ancestors, her inner voice, the natural world—that follows her everywhere she goes... even to space. 

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Ty Defoe is a citizen of the Anishinaabe and Oneida Nations and a Grammy Award–winning writer and interdisciplinary artist. A sovereign story trickster, Ty creates work at the intersection of performance, land-based practice, technology, and decolonial futurity. Their work moves fluidly between rural and urban communities, Broadway theaters, universities, and the metaverse, fostering relational, Indigenous-centered approaches to storytelling and cultural production. Ty is a recipient of fellowships and awards from the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, MacDowell, Sundance Institute, the Pop Culture Collaborative’s Trans Futurist, and was named a 2026 United States Artist Fellow. Their creative practice is rooted in collaboration and care, often blending theater, music, movement, visual design, and emerging technologies to imagine Indigenous and decolonial futures. Ty’s writing has been published by Bloomsbury and in outlets including Casting a Movement, Thorny Locust, and Bloomsbury Publishing, and is currently working on Trans World, a play cycle commissioned by the Binger Center for New Theater at Yale.They hold degrees from the California Institute of the Arts (BFA), Goddard College (MFA), and New York University Tisch School of the Arts (MFA). Ty is a member of All My Relations Collective, Indigenous Direction, an Olga Denison Scholar at CMU, Professor of Practice at ASU, and is currently Writer-in-Residence at PACE. www.tydefoe.com

GRAMMY and NAMA nominated performer, composer, professor, Dawn Ieri’hó:kwats Avery has worked with musical luminaries Pavarotti, Sting, Nakai, and Shenandoah; composers Cage, Wuorinen, Glass, Chacon, Becenti and, Indigenous elders Jan Kahehti:io Longboat, Tom Sakokwen’ion:kwas Porter, Ray Ta’wente’se John, among others. Holding a place of peace, spirit, and passion, Dawn Avery draws from her devotion to sacred world traditions, including those from her own Kaniènkéha (Mohawk) heritage. Her music can be understood as a sonic journey of awareness.

Avery’s work has been performed at the National Museum of the American Indian, Lincoln and Kennedy Centers, throughout Europe, and at many Universities and Indigenous communities. She has been composing a series of orchestral works that serve as a musical acknowledgment to honor the Indigenous ancestors, legacy, and land upon which the ensembles perform and live. Grounded in the ancient history of the land through the vibration of sound, the performers are asked to recite the names of the nations who have and continue to live in that area today. Entitled Indian Territory with specific nation names, works have been performed by the Albany, Alexandria, Ancaster, and Williamsburg Symphony Orchestras, along with several chamber groups throughout Turtle Island.

Azica Records released several of her cello works played by Wilhelmina Smith Sweetgrass (2025) and has an upcoming recording of her chamber works performed by Salt Bay ChamberFest musicians; both produced by Judith Sherman and directed by Wilhelmina Smith. She has composed and recorded in a variety of styles on Okenti records that have won several Global Music Awards. Along with Mitchell and Tarrant, Avery composed music an Indigenous-based theatre project Ajijaak on Turtle Island; written and directed by Ty Defoe; Heather Henson’s (of the Jim Henson legacy) production.

Avery composed for the award-winning film Imagining the Indian: The Fight Against Native Mascots and won best composer in the Paris Women’s Film Festival (Iotsistokwaron:ion, performed by Duo Concertante). Two of her short operas, including Trials and Tears with libretto by Ty Defoe, will be performed at The Cooper Union in NYC on November 5, 2026.

Jolie Cloutier is a NYC based actor and writer. A member of Onondaga Nation (Wolf Clan) Jolie celebrates her Indigenous identity in every work of art. Jolie has appeared in a variety of Native American theater and film productions. Jolie is currently studying acting at HB Studio in their Uta Hagen Core Conservatory Program.

Jessica Ranville: Off-Broadway: Empire: The Musical New World Stages; Between Two Knees (u/s) PACNYC; Manahatta (u/s) The Public Theater, Stupid F*cking Bird (u/s) The Pearl Theater. Regional: Where We Belong Oregon Shakespeare Festival & Portland Center Stage, Men On Boats Baltimore Center Stage. Jessica is Red River Metis from Winnipeg, Manitoba. She has taught movement at Brooklyn College and has been a recurring teaching artist and resident artist at IRT Theater in Manhattan. MFA: The New School for Drama.

OPEN STUDIOS is a series of work-in-progress showings held regularly throughout the year, organized by guest curators, and serves as an incubator for new work, inviting the public into the artistic process.