Mar Parrilla

Afrotaíno borikua and award-winning choreographer Mar Parrilla is the founding artistic director of Danza Orgánica. She is a proud mother, community organizer, and aspiring herbalist. After attaining a BA in Languages (Italian, French) from the Universidad de Puerto Rico, Mar crossed the ocean to Nueva York, where she completed a Master's degree in Dance Education at New York University. Now a Boston resident, Parrilla is a recipient of several awards from the New England Foundation for the Arts, and the Boston Foundation, among others. She is the recipient of the Brother Thomas Fellowship Award from the Boston Foundation, and the Outstanding Community Arts Collaboration Award in Dance from the Arts/Learning Organization. 
Mar is also the founder of the acclaimed program Dance for Social Justice™, as well as the founding producer of the Boston-based annual festival: We Create! Parrilla is a luminary artist at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, where she has been commissioned to create artistic work- and continues to work with in several capacities.
Mar Parrilla/ Danza Orgánica received a Creative Development Residency at Jacob's Pillow, where they also performed at the Inside/Out Festival. In 2018, Mar was selected for the city of Boston Artist in Residence program, with a focus on Environmental Justice. Currently, she is collaborating with Puerto Rico-based artists on a residency-based multiyear cultural exchange towards the development of Melaza: a project that explores the colonial relationship between Puerto Rico and the United States of North America. She is also working in close collaboration with members of the Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe, through a multiyear partnership between Danza Orgánica, the Aquinnah Cultural Center, and The Yard. 
Mar has been a dance educator in Boston and NYC public schools, Boston University, New York State University at Stony Brook, Wesleyan University, and Roxbury Community College, to name a few. Currently, she is faculty at Emerson College.

Mar's production history includes annual company concerts since 2007, as well as the annual festival: We Create! (running since 2014). She is also the founder and curator of the Dance Research Online Forum- a site dedicated to free and progressive dance education.
For awards and recognition, please visit our website: www.danzaorganica.org

Mar speaks Spanish, English, Portuguese, French, and Italian fluently.
 

Danza Orgánica Core Values

Misión

Founded in 2007 by Mar Parrilla- Danza Orgánica is a Boston-based dance theater company whose work is centered around equity, social justice and decolonization.

Through high-quality performance, education (Dance for Social Justice™), and our annual festival We Create, we work with-and-for communities interested in embodying a liberated future. We honor our right to express our BIPOC experience, joyfully reimagine ourselves in liberated BIPOC bodies, and leave a legacy that sheds light upon an untold side of history.

We are in solidarity with BIPOC, LGBTQI, and communities that face racial, ability-based, economic, xenophobic and/or colonial oppression. 

Compromiso

We are committed to working with and for the community. We start within our own community in Danza Orgánica- a relationship based on love, trust, respect, and committed to our mission. 

Our commitment includes:

an anti-racist and de-colonial praxis within our creations, performance, and work with the community.
performance: we are committed to bringing high quality dance theater to boston and beyond. we recognize the need for equity and anti-racist frameworks in our community, and work towards that goal. 
dance for social justice: we are committed to working collaboratively with the community through a facilitated process of social justice-oriented art creations. our signature program: dance for social justice, has been designed for all members of society, of all ages and abilities.
bipoc artists: we facilitate a platform that amplifies the experiences of bipoc artists in our society, through our annual festival: we create!  this is an anti-racist, anti-patriarchal, and decolonial platform.
borikén (puerto rico): we are committed to amplifying the borikua experience in the united states and beyond. we do so via our collaborative project: proyecto melaza.
we are committed to supporting indigenous communities as we continue our journey towards decolonization. we do so through community-oriented gatherings, community-based artistic creations, performance work, collaborations, and ongoing solidarity.