A Call to Prayer

Performed by dance artist and choreographer Zaquia Luisa Salinas alongside Sergio Barrientos and Guillermo Castro, this physically demanding modern dance work moves through diasporic memory, ancestral inheritance, destruction, restoration, and hope. Blending ritual, movement, and electronic sound, the performers journey into and emerge from darkness, invoking dance as an act of reclamation, resistance, and collective world-building.

“What they build between them compresses global histories and prayers into one liquid container—rituals coalescing into a physically demanding finale of electronic resistance, a universal meditation on the desire to hold faith against political constriction. Important hope.” — ankita, thINKingDANCE

Zaquia Luisa Salinas is a dance artist, choreographer, educator, curator, producer, and organizer whose work approaches movement as an act of reclamation and world-building. Centering collaboration and collective liberation, her interdisciplinary practice engages diasporic memory and shared responsibility. Originally from San Diego, she is the founder and Director Emerita of DISCO RIOT and currently serves as Resident Curator at ODC Theater in San Francisco. She also teaches in higher education and is developing Ephemeral Artery, a platform supporting creative practice and project development.

Guillermo Castro is a New York–based dancer and choreographer from San Diego. He holds a BFA in Dance and Choreography from UC Santa Barbara, where he performed works by José Limón, Shen Wei, Ephrat Asherie, Andrea Schermoly, Stephanie Miracle, Brandon Whited, and Nancy Colahan. He has toured with LitvakDance and DISCO RIOT and performed with Santa Barbara Dance Theater, San Diego Dance Theater, Unity Dance Ensemble, and Selah Dance Collective. Alongside his work as a freelance performer, he develops his own choreographic projects.

Sergio Barrientos is a New York–based freelance dance artist originally from California. He began his formal training at 14 and earned a BFA in Dance from UC Santa Barbara, where he worked with Monica Bill Barnes, Jacqulyn Buglisi, Doug Elkins, Ephrat Asherie, and Alice Condodina on reconstructed works by José Limón. Since relocating to New York, he has continued developing his practice through floorwork techniques and collaborations with local choreographers.