Irishia Hubbard Romaine (she/her) is a choreographer, filmmaker, and educator from South Carolina. She is an Assistant Professor in the School of Dance at Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania and a 2024 Mellon Arts & Practitioner Fellow at the Yale Center for the Study of Race, Indigeneity, and Transnational Migration (RITM). Additionally, Irishia holds the distinction of being the inaugural recipient of the Donald McKayle Legacy scholarship.

Her research in screendance examines the unwritten history of Black moving image arts by analyzing Africanist Aesthetics in American dance, photography, and film. In the Spring of 2024, she will complete a Short-Term Fellowship at the New York Public Library’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture dedicated to supporting her proposed project, “Reimagining Screendance: Reclamation of Black Aesthetics in Dance Film History.”

Irishia has worked with renowned choreographers, including Donald McKayle, Joanna Kotze, Ephrat Asherie, Dr. Ama S. Wray, Idan Cohen, and Greg Chapkis. In 2022, she was awarded a Hicks Choreographer Fellowship from the School of Jacob’s Pillow, where she received mentorship from Dianne McIntyre and Risa Steinberg. Her work has been featured in various California-based festivals, such as the BlakTinx Dance Festival, HHII Dance Festival, ArtBark International, Dancexchange, Highways 50/50 Show, Pasadena Dance Festival, San Pedro Festival of the Arts, Spector Dance, and Lula Washington Dance Theater’s “Dance All Day” Festival.

As a filmmaker, Irishia’s work explores themes of visibility, ancestral veneration, and Black liberation. She has studied under screendance artists Katrina McPherson, Cara Hagan, Kelly Hargraves, Robin Gee, Ben Estabrook, Chad Michael Hall, and Charlotte Griffin; and is currently a board member of Dance Camera West. Irishia’s films have achieved international acclaim, premiering at esteemed festivals including Cinevox, ADF Movie By Movers, Auro Apaar, Black Lives Rising, Mignolo International Screendance Festival, Muestra Movimiento Audiovisual, Dancecinema, Desassossego Short Dance Film Festival, and many more. Notably, her film, “Red Line,” was selected for Dance Camera West’s 2022 Mentorship Program and received the Denton Black Film Festival’s 2024 Virtual People’s Choice Award. This captivating piece has been screened across diverse locations, including India, Spain, Mexico, California, Oregon, Washington D.C., North Carolina, Texas, Michigan, Utah, and the United Kingdom.

Irishia holds an MFA in Modern Dance and a Screendance certification from the University of Utah, where she received the Ellen Bromberg Dance Media Award, the College of Fine Arts Creative Research Award, and a University Teaching Assistantship (UTA). Her other roles include a professional stager for the Donald McKayle Legacy and Visibility Program Director for Dance Camera West.