Unnamed Bone was a mostly unison dance that consisted of movement centered entirely around the pelvis. Conceived by achugar, the work was a physical exploration of the different cultural, energetic, social and sensual connotations of this often charged part of the body. The propulsive original music was created by Michael Floyd. The work was performed several times, including Movement Research at Judson Church, Dixon Place, and as part of Dance Theater Workshop’s Fresh Tracks series, all in New York City.

“The gripping closing duet, “Unnamed Bone,” choreographed and performed by Luciana Achugar and Levi Gonzalez, was executed with a flawless synchronization that underlined the creepy design of its sequence of disconnected body shapes. Discovered lying on their sides with hands behind their backs, the dancers appeared to be armless. We remained riveted as intense noises and pulsing kinetic forces propelled the bodies toward one another and through a wonderfully alien spectrum of movements.”
– Lisa Jo Sagolla, Backstage

Hit was created as part of the Dance and Process program at The Kitchen, NYC, curated by Dean Moss. In this work with original music and live mixing by Michael Floyd, achugar and Gonzalez created a flat, video game like physicality that eventually devolves into a series of hits and slaps, building a choreography of actual flesh on flesh impact. Dancing becomes a charged physical investment that builds in intensity.

Commissioned by Dance Theater Workshop, this quartet again featured original music by Michael Floyd as well as performers Melanie Maar and Emily Tepper joining achugar and Gonzalez. This work explored the use of the limbs and the head as driving the movement, often in wild, barely controlled arcs of kinetic energy.

Based on HIT, originally performed at The Kitchen in December 2002, HIT AGAIN is a collaboration between NY based choreographers luciana achugar and Levi Gonzalez, who have a long history together as collaborators, performers and friends. Using their 2002 collaboration HIT as a jumping off point, HIT AGAIN is an attempt for these two artists to reconnect with each other through their work after working independently for the last ten years, and to examine the shared concerns which brought them together in the first place and how those concerns have grown, diverged and shifted over time. Having dedicated their lives to dance, they are interested in how their work reflects and often directly shapes their lives, relationships, and ways of being in the world. Using their own physical memories and the documentation of the 2002 piece as a point of reference, luciana and Levi reflect on their own artistic and personal development since that time, on what matters to them now, and on why those things that mattered to them then mattered in the first place. Using the unique ability of performance to capture and distill the present moment in all its layers and complexities, luciana and Levi create a work which allows for them to be in dialogue with each other, their own histories, and their many questions and desires around this artform.

My first independent work was a quartet presented by Danspace Project in NYC. The work featured performances by Gonzalez, luciana achugar, Hristoula Harakas and Heather Olson with original music by Corey Tut.

My first evening-length work presented by Dance Theater Workshop. The work featured performances by Gonzalez, Hristoula Harakas, Isabel Lewis and Kayvon Pourazar with original music by James Lo and lighting design by Joe Levasseur. The work was a collage of different movement motifs that existed alongside a stage that gradually became more and more full of clutter and random objects.

A solo project performed in multiple venues in which I performed excerpts of the work of other choreographers that was not designed to be put on my body. This was an attempt to create an embodied archive of the work of my peers as well as a practice in losing performative ego and attending to the nuances of each choreographer’s unique work. Choreographers represented included Daria Faïn, Beth Gill, Miguel Gutierrez, Maria Hassabi, John Jasperse, Juliette Mapp, Melinda Ring and Donna Uchizono.

Presented at Highways Performance Space in Los Angeles, just before the covid shutdown which caused me to take a hiatus from making work. This was a quartet for Zena Bibler, DaEun Jung, Daniel Miramontes and sam wentz with original music by Gillian Rae Perry. This work began an exploration into new ways of relating to audience, objects and space that continues in my current project.