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Dance & Performance Studies Guest Artists

Each semester �鶹ɫ��Ƭ’s Dance & Performance Studies Program welcomes a diverse roster of artists to work directly with our students via our outstanding guest artist residency program.  These internationally renowned artists offer students a range of dynamic first-hand learning experiences via master classes, repertory rehearsals, and face to face feedback – enhancing each dancer’s networking skills and professional contacts.

Working with a steady rotation of touring artists also helps �鶹ɫ��Ƭ dancers experience the vast potential and varied paths within the field of movement studies – which helps each student develop their own identities as artists, scholars, and professionals.

Fall 2025

Deanna Gerde – September 22 – 26

Deanna Gerde (she/her) is a dance artist and choreographer based in Rhode Island. She was born in Syracuse, New York, and received her formal dance training from SUNY Brockport and The Joffrey Ballet School in Manhattan. Deanna began her career as a freelance artist in Manhattan, and subsequently danced with Ballet Arkansas from 2017-2019. She moved on to dance with Newport Contemporary Ballet from 2019 to 2025. Her performance credits include that of Danielle Genest, Miki Ohlsen, Tristian Griffin, Simona Di Tullio, Cyrus Khambatta, John Malashock, Colin Connor, Francesca Genovese, Tania Perez-Selas, Caleb Mitchell, Yoshito Sakuraba, Amy Hall Garner, Kristopher Estes-Brown, Caroline Dahm, and more.

Deanna also teaches dance in the RI area, both in dance schools, and through educational outreach to local elementary and middle schools. She feels passionate about enriching young minds through art and community. 

As a choreographer, Deanna has presented work with Choreography Project Providence, the Newport Dance Festival, Puddingstone Festival (in collaboration with Katie Moorhead), Newport Contemporary Ballet, Cre8Dance Pittsburgh (in collaboration with Benjamin Rabe), and NCB Junior Company. Her work reflects a mindfulness towards connection, and emphasis on distinct musicality. Deanna hopes to continue to tell stories through movement that reach viewers in a way that makes them feel connected to the art, and to those around them. Explore Deanna’s to learn more!
 

Deanna Pellecchia - October 20 - 24

DeAnna Pellecchia (�鶹ɫ��Ƭ ’99, B.A. Dance/Performance) is an artist working in the medium of dance and choreography, hailed by The Boston Globe as “compelling, intense…a committed and daring performer.” Over the past 25 years, she has defied boundaries—dancing with horses, in trees, on stilts, underwater, and through air—while making her mark across operas, plays, fashion shows, films, rodeos, books, music videos, and more, touring and teaching in the U.S., India, Russia, and France.

Her performances have been featured at venues and festivals worldwide, including The Kennedy Center (Washington D.C.), Dance Theater Workshop (NYC), The Los Angeles Convention Center, Burning Man, The Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), and The National School of Drama (India). She has been a principal dancer with Paula Josa-Jones/Performance Works since 2000, and with Anikaya Dance Theater, Kinodance Company, Bennett Dance Company, Nicola Hawkins Dance Company, and Anna Myer & Dancers. She has also performed as a guest artist with Elaine Summers, Ann Carlson, and Heidi Latsky.

As a choreographer, Pellecchia’s work has been presented by the Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston, The Huntington Theatre, Charles Playhouse/Broadway Across America, and The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. In 2012, she founded KAIROS Dance Theater, a nationally touring company creating bold, interdisciplinary performances, where she serves as Artistic Director and choreographer.

Currently, Pellecchia is on faculty at Boston University’s College of Fine Arts and New England Conservatory’s Opera Studies Department. Previously, she served on faculty at Boston Ballet, Simmons College, and the Cambridge School of Weston, and has been a guest artist at Mount Holyoke College, Boston Conservatory, Massachusetts College of Art, and Russia’s Evolution Dance Project. Her foundation at �鶹ɫ��Ƭ continues to inform her teaching and artistic practice, shaping her commitment to mentorship, experimentation, and dance as a tool for social and cultural impact.

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More about �鶹ɫ��Ƭ’s Dance & Performance Program

• The Dance and Performance Studies Major and Minor
• Dance/Performance Web Pages

Contact

Professor of Dance and Performance Studies, Cathy Nicoli, cnicoli@rwu.edu