algorithm. - Choreography by Meredith Aleigha Wells // Counterbalance Dance Festival

algorithm. 2022 Counterbalance Dress Rehearsal.
Choreographed and Performed by Meredith Aleigha Wells.
Soundscape by Miguel Angel Paredes

Choreographer’s Note: If Instagram is dying what does it matter if one gets off the platform? What are we going to do when Tik Tok dismantles the big social media giants and inevitably fades away in relevancy? When all that is left is a landscape of smaller niche social medias, how will we allocate our time and energy? When did these social media giants stop valuing art and stillness and start innocuously engineering these apps to keep us glued to our phones scrolling faster faster faster. Why do we willingly let these tech companies sell our attention as ad space? At what point will the social media train just run off the tracks? These are some of the questions that led me to create algorithm. I feel grateful to share this piece in one of the few places we commit to a few hours without distraction, the theater.

MEREDITH ALEIGHA WELLS (they/she) is a multidisciplinary artist originally from Massachusetts. They hold a BA in Music, Theatre, and Dance from the University of Massachusetts Amherst where they served as a research assistant to Brown Paper Studio Methodology founder Judyie Al Balali.

A mere five years into their performing career, Meredith has worked in film, musical theater and on the concert dance stage touring nationally and internationally with such companies as Underdog Project Theatre, Dancing Wheels Company and the cast of How the Grinch Stole Christmas the Musical, marking the first performance in a Broadway national tour by a wheelchair user. Meredith has performed works by Donald McKayle, Marc Brew, Antoine Hunter, Catherine Meredith, Laurel Lawson, Heidi Latsky, James Morrow, David Dorfman, Mark Tomasic, David Rousseve, and Diane McIntyre; making appearances in Dance St. Louis, Seattle Repertory Theatre, OHIODance Festival, Playhouse Square, New York Theatre Workshop, Ailey Citigroup Theatre, The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, CounterBalance and the Luminous Festival in Beijing China.

As a creative, Meredith’s work takes on a broad range of roles ranging from choreographer, playwright, movement translator, to devising artist/collaborator. Their work has been presented at New Africa House Basement Theater, Playhouse Square, University of California Irvine, UMass Emerging Choreographers Series, Triskelion Arts, and Cleveland Public Theatre. In 2017, Meredith took their debut playwriting and choreographic work, Dysfunctioning Just Fine the musical, on a northeastern school tour with Underdog Project Theatre, culminating in a run at the My True Colors Festival where they received the Purple Skies Playwright Award. @meredithaleighawells www.meredithaleighawells.com