An altered version of an app-created, selfie style photo that was made to look like it was painted, and mostly finished. My face is visible, as are short dark hair, a black sweater collar, and dark-rimmed glasses that lay slightly crooked on my face, as in the real source selfie. I have a slightly bemused expression with brown eyes that can be seen looking slightly above the glasses. (The app is called MyProfilePic and is pretty popular at the moment.)

Alejandra Ospina

is a first-generation native New Yorker with roots in Colombia. She has been active for many years in advocacy and performance projects locally and beyond. In her youth, she was a founding member of the Fearless Theater Company in NYC, performing with Itzhak Perlman at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall in Claire’s Broom Detective Agency: The Mystery of the Missing Violin.

In recent years, she has had the opportunity to re-engage with the stage, including as a member of the inaugural cohort of the Theatre for All intensive program for emerging actors with disabilities at the Queens Theatre (2018).  She has since performed in several projects via Queens Theatre (including a summer 2020 staging of Emily Driver’s Great Race Through Time and Space!), as well as through its partnership with the Phamaly Theatre Company in Colorado.

 She has previously trained and performed in physically integrated dance work (Infinity Dance Theater, Heidi Latsky Dance, ZCO Dance Project).

She sings regularly with the Peace of Heart Choir, and sometimes with other folks, too.

She works regularly as a media access provider on a variety of projects, for which she might create content as an audio describer, translator, or closed caption provider.

Alejandra is the Program Coordinator for Dark Room Ballet with Krishna Washburn, an ongoing educational program that prioritizes the needs of blind and visually impaired dance students at introductory and advanced levels.

She is also pursuing narration and voiceover projects, and can be heard as the primary narrator for the audiobook version of Disability Visibility: First Person Stories from the 21st Century (Edited by Alice Wong, Vintage Books, 2020).

Places you might find me: 

Facebook, Twitter (public),  LinkedIn (CV of sorts is there), Flickr, Tumblr (sometimes) and even a bit of TikTok. I have also loved and lived in Second Life.

Something worth sharing:

Recently:

In place of catastrophe… a clear night sky

Virtual production expected September 2022

In place of catastrophe, a clear night sky is a live, multidisciplinary dance performance, which decenters sight as the primary mode of experiencing dance. The piece premiered at Danspace Project in May 2022, after a two-year postponement due to COVID-19. Centering the needs of blind, visually impaired, immunocompromised and disabled cast and community, director iele paloumpis and their collaborators have transformed the piece into a hybrid live and virtual experience. We are excited to finally share this labor of love. 

Listen to the first episode of our podcast, “In place of catastrophe: we begin again” on Spotify or SoundCloud, or read the transcript here. Over the course of 7 episodes, we’ll share some of our research into creating poetic audio description for dance and multi-sensory performance for blind and partially sighted audiences. Our hope is to reach our communities and feel connected in this time of ongoing isolation and multiple systemic catastrophes. Learn more about the podcast here.