Ayibobo! Thank you for reading my call to action and ask for support to develop my work "Jérémie au coeur de ma vie" for the stage in 2025. We have reached past the $1000 mark and still need your support!!!

About Me 😊

I am a dance artist, researcher and doctor of communication studies who goes by the name of Emilie-Andrée Roumer Jabouin; and my artist name is Zila. I am also the founder of a performance, research and production company, Do Gwe dance & research since 2020 (www.emiliejabouin.ca) that merges performance and research to provide accessible historical knowledge to audiences for social transformation and collective healing.

About the Project. My project was anonymously selected by the Festival Quatre Chemins 2024 in Haiti to explore a difficult topic in Haitian history. This is the story of “Les Vêpres jérémiennes,” when the Tonton Macoutes (government militia) murdered entire families under Duvalier in 1964 in Jérémie, Grand'Anse in Haïti, where my parents grew up. These horrific events caused my paternal grandfather to die of a heart attack shortly after.

This piece “Jérémie, au Coeur de ma vie,” which means, “Jérémie, at the core of my life” speaks to memories of my parents speaking about Jérémie—this magical place—on a daily basis growing up. I also found that the historical tensions around Les Vêpres reflect some of the underlying issues that currently threaten the stability and growth of the country.

Why a fundraising campaign and why now?

My creative inner child is calling me to continue digging and workshopping the piece to present it at Allies & Friends, hosted by the Wind-in-the-Leaves Collective, on March 21 & 22nd, 2025 in Toronto, Canada. I am truly grateful for this invitation to showcase this particular work that I did not anticipate would grow so quickly. This creative process is important to fund because it shares historical events seldom talked about and can enable people—especially those who have lived under a dictatorship—the possibility to process, be seen, and release traumatic events by witnessing movement, dance and performance, song, and rhythm.

In order to prepare a strong presentation in March and to properly remunerate the live percussionist and dancers I am working with, I need to raise these additional funds.

Zila at the Mausoleum, Piste no. 2, Jérémie, Haïti, November 2024

My creative journey with this piece started with the Festival Quatre Chemins 2024 based in Port-au-Prince, Haiti for which I pieced together this difficult history through an artistic residency, connecting movement and research. Nature was my teacher. I created amongst the trees, by the ocean at the Anse d'Azur beach, and visited the location of the mass graves where the families were executed.

It was hard and liberating at the same time, because I felt I was breaking a tradition of silence. I started developing a dance solo that explores the layered emotional narrative of the story, followed by a group choreography that represents the words of appreciation, solidarity, peer-support, hope, and joy of being together that the local dancers expressed after each class I taught.

The Only Resolve is to DANCE…

The piece enables me to create a platform for people to share their truth and face—with mediated risk—their negative past experiences.

“Cleansing,” Pebbles Beach, Barbados, by Arnaldo James

We will be a total of 4 artists. We will be three dance artists, Aisha Nicholson (@movementcheckin), myself(@zila_danceandresearch) and Cuban percussionist Reimundo Sosa (@reimundososa) on stage and 2 more, a seamstress and my outside eye, Jillia Cato! (@jilliacato) who will be involved in the process. The dancers include myself, also as choreographer and director. We are four strongly rooted and experienced artists who continue to believe we can live from our art and make GREAT work for our audiences!

So, we need your help to continue to create, DANCE, release, and heal through stories that are better told through movement and rhythm.

I am committed to curating this story with integrity and paying the artists well.

100% of the funds raised will go to the artists directly in the development, rehearsals, which entail an investment in deeply exploring the stories, movements, sounds, and rhythms of this piece. This will complement the support from Wind-in-the-Leaves Collective.

Our group will also perform the piece outside of the province in November 2025. These funds will enable us to solidify the work, so that remounting it later in the year will be less costly and relatively painless.

We—dancers, creators, and also audiences—deserve to have all of our heart’s desires!

Thank you for your generous contributions!!!

	The group at the Alliance Française, (left to right) Christopher, Zila, Wood, Medjeanin, Sarah, Anne, Mara, Junior, Natacha, Pétuelle in Jérémie, Haïti, November 2024
	“Kriye Bode,” at the Alliance Française, Jérémie, Haïti, November 2024

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Thank you also to the group of artists in Jérémie who made it possible for me to begin creating this work and to this nature gem, l’Anse d’Azur in Jérémie that is my primary source of creation! My plan is to eventually return and remount the piece on the dancers in Haiti to perform a final version.

The group of dancers, drummers and designers (left to right: Junior, Pétuelle, Evains, Christopher, Medjeanin, Wood, Annie, James, Natacha, Peterson, Junior, and Jackson), Auberge’Inn, Jérémie, November 2024	L’Anse d’Azur, “my source of creation,” Jérémie, Haïti, November 2024