By: Andre
On June 28, 2026, the multimedia live performance SUNGOD (Destiny) was presented at The Sanctuary at St. Paul & St. Andrew in New York as part of the CWP Evolution Festival. Set against the cultural traditions of the Ibaloi people of the Philippines, the work brought contemporary dance, visual media, and live music together in a single performance space and was created by participants from diverse cultural and artistic backgrounds. Huang Xiaoxia participated in the work as a featured performer and choreographic collaborator. With years of experience in dance education and choreography, she continued to explore embodied expression and collaborative creation through this cross-cultural artistic project.
Before coming to New York, Huang Xiaoxia spent many years at Tsinghua University teaching and choreographing for students who were not dance majors. Beyond focusing on movement and technical training, her teaching emphasized how students could develop an understanding of themselves and others through embodied experiences and creative processes. During her studies at New York University, she also gained practical experience with the Education Department of the Joyce Theater. Her individual choreographic work, cross-cultural performances, and arts education activities have gradually become important components of her professional practice in New York, allowing her to apply the teaching and choreographic experience she has developed over the years in a new cultural and professional context.
In April 2026, Huang Xiaoxia completed her original choreographic work, Space Becomes Infinite, in New York. The work subsequently premiered at the Frederick Loewe Theatre at New York University. It explores the memories and emotions that persist after loss, as well as the distance that remains between people. Through constantly shifting spatial relationships and physical states among the dancers, it seeks to express inner experiences that are difficult to convey directly through language. This work continues her long-standing artistic focus on embodied expression, emotional experience, and individual perception, while allowing these themes to take on new forms within New York’s creative environment.
In SUNGOD (Destiny), this focus on embodied experience was explored through a collaborative creative process involving multiple cultures and media forms. As a featured performer and choreographic collaborator, Huang Xiaoxia participated in the rehearsals and performance of the work, engaging in a creative process shaped by the interaction among movement, music, visual media, and cultural experiences. The collaboration also gave her direct experience of exploring embodied expression through cross-cultural artistic practice.
In addition, Huang Xiaoxia was invited to participate in Lincoln Center’s Summer Forum: Moving the Field Forward. This professional program focuses on arts education practices and brings together arts educators from New York and other regions to explore diverse approaches to arts education through immersive workshops, experimental practices, live performances, and discussions. For Huang Xiaoxia, who has extensive experience in university-level dance education, this peer-learning environment provided an opportunity for arts educators from different regions and professional backgrounds to engage in direct exchanges of ideas and perspectives.
While gaining practical experience with the Education Department of the Joyce Theater, Huang Xiaoxia continued to engage with dance education and public engagement practices within a professional theater environment. Her work involving artistic works, audiences, and participants provided a new professional reference point for her existing teaching and choreographic practice and gave her a more concrete understanding of the relationships among embodied expression, collaborative creation, and artistic participation. Heather McCartney, Director of Dance Education & Family Programs at the Joyce Theater, recognized Huang’s engagement with K-12 dance teaching strategies, theater education methods, and related practices in New York, and expressed that she looked forward to Huang’s continued development as an artist and educator.
Her years of teaching, choreography, and stage practice have established the professional foundation for her continued work in New York. The new cultural environment, collaborative relationships, and artistic projects have enabled the areas she has long explored to take on new forms across different creative settings. Her journey in New York is still ongoing and is becoming an important part of the continued development of her long-term dance practice.
