Discipline: Interdisciplinary Art – movement

Jakari Sherman

Discipline: Interdisciplinary Art – movement
Region: Houston, TX
MacDowell Fellowships: 2025

Jakari Sherman is a choreographer and director of dance-based productions rooted in the percussive tradition of stepping. He is writing his first science fiction novel, which explores a futurist perspective on maroonage and myriad notions of freedom and emancipated communities.

While at MacDowell, Sherman developed a script, music, and choreography for the production Our Road Home. This included experimental recordings of water-based instruments, and environmental sounds throughout the MacDowell property. The work will premiere in June 2025 in Houston Freedmen's Town as part of the 160th commemoration of its founding. Sherman also shared the movement practice of stepping with the Peterborough community in a workshop at Monadnock Academy of Movement Arts, and began development of a notation system for stepping that will be used for future music composition and collaboration.

Portrait by Shaider Divina

Studios

Firth

Jakari Sherman worked in the Firth studio.

Originally a working barn perched atop the namesake hill of Hillcrest Farm, this building was converted to serve the arts in 1956. A grand set of windows was installed to make the large interior suitable for visual artists, bringing in abundant natural light from the north. The addition of a screened porch and accessible entrance ramp…

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