Harkness Promise Award

Baye & Asa, selected as one of Dance Magazine’s ”25 to Watch“ for 2022, is a company creating movement art projects directed & choreographed by Amadi ‘Baye’ Washington & Sam ‘Asa’Pratt. They grew up together in New York City, and that shared educational history is the mother of their work. Hip Hop & African dance languages are the foundation of their technique. The rhythms of these techniques inform the way they energetically confront contemporary dance & theater. They use their choreography to create political metaphors, interrogate systemic inequities, and contemporize ancient allegories; building theatrical contexts that celebrate, implicate, and condemn the characters onstage. Their dance work has been presented at The Joyce Theater, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club, Pioneer Works, The 92nd Street Y, Baryshnikov Arts Center, Jacob’s Pillow, ODC, Blacklight Summit, Gibney Dance Center, Thread Artist Space in Senegal, Future Dance Festival, Southampton Arts Center, Westbeth, and Battery Dance Festival, while their film work has won numerous awards and has been presented internationally.