Best Ruby Josephine Smith Podcasts (2024)

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Episode 36: Taylor Drury - Grounding, Wobbling, and Other Dance Practices 1:01:12

3+ y ago1:01:12

1:01:12

Taylor Drury is a Canadian born dancer, choreographer, and sometimes line-drawing artist with WobbleWorks. She is currently a full time company member with the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch. In this conversation we talk all about her path to becoming a dancer, which was full of the unexpected, as well as the period of doubting and questioning t…

1
Episode 35: Sakina Saïdi - Illustrating Identities and Growing into Your Own Voice 58:34

3+ y ago58:34

58:34

Sakina Saïdi is a French-Moroccan artist and illustrator based in London. Born and raised in France by Moroccan parents, Sakina grew up learning about different cultures and traditions. Her experiences nurtured her style and desire to represent this beautiful mix of cultures that now characterizes her personality and art. In this conversation, we t…

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(BONUS) Episode 34: Samantha Hope Galler and John Harnage - On Creating ViVa, a Celebration of Dance & Creativity During a Pandemic 40:37

3+ y ago40:37

40:37

Created in response to the pandemic, ViVa marks the first collaboration between two giants in the dance world, the Miami City Ballet and the Paul Taylor Dance Company. Choreographed by Amy Hall Garner, ViVa was choreographed remotely and filmed in two different cities, premiering and streaming on the companies’ social media channels. In this specia…

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Episode 33: Michael Novak - Curating Experience & Supporting Culture as Artistic Director of the Paul Taylor Dance Company 1:00:27

3+ y ago1:00:27

1:00:27

Michael Novak is a dancer born and raised in Illinois. In 2018, he became the Paul Taylor Dance Company’s second Artistic Director after having danced for the company for 9 years. Previously, he also danced with Gibney Dance and the Daniel Gwirtzman Dance Company, studied at Springboard Danse Montreal, and has performed works by Bill T. Jones, Vasl…

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Episode 32: Dylan Frederick - Fleeting, Glistening Moments of Theater 1:05:33

3+ y ago1:05:33

1:05:33

Dylan Frederick is an actor, writer and director who was born and raised in the Twin Cities. He has an MFA from the Yale School of Drama and a BFA from The University of Evansville. Dylan recently made his Broadway debut in Matthew Lopez’s 7-hour play The Inheritance. He also makes music and summer camps. In this conversation between two old friend…

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Episode 31: Cozbi A. Cabrera - Living Enriches the Art, and the Entry Point is the Heart 1:02:44

3+ y ago1:02:44

1:02:44

Cozbi A. Cabrera is a multimedia artist who lives in Evanston, Illinois. She paints, writes and illustrates children’s books, makes handmade collectible dolls, quilts, and designs clothing. In this conversation that weaves through the threads of all of her mediums, Cozbi and I speak about the senses and details of memory, how she took a non-linear …

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Episode 30: Tamisha Guy & Donovan Reed - Dancing with A.I.M. by Kyle Abraham and Advocacy in Art 1:02:32

3+ y ago1:02:32

1:02:32

Tamisha Guy and Donovan Reed are both dancers within the renowned company A.I.M. by Kyle Abraham. In this in-depth conversation on process, I ask them about their paths to becoming the dancers they are today and how they joined A.I.M., as well as what real collaboration looks like within the creation process of the company. Tamisha and Donovan also…

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Episode 29: Olaiya Land - Navigating Social Media (and Life) with Creativity and Conviction 1:05:54

4y ago1:05:54

1:05:54

Olaiya Land is based in Seattle and is the founder and editor of Lionesse, an online journal and community promoting connection, confidence, sisterhood & self-love. She also leads creative retreats and is a photographer. In this energizing conversation, we get deep into how to use social media as a creative person to create community. We also speak…

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Episode 28: Ella Frances Sanders - Big Questions and a Few Birds 1:03:52

4y ago1:03:52

1:03:52

Ella Frances Sanders is based in Ireland and is an internationally-bestselling author and illustrator of three books: Lost in Translation, The Illustrated Book of Sayings, and Eating the Sun. In this conversation we speak about topics such as why and how she feels that asking questions is her love language, the constant connections she finds betwee…

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Episode 27: Farida Hughes - Blending Colors and Communities 52:45

4y ago52:45

52:45

Farida Hughes is an abstract artist working in mixed media, oil, and resin paint on panel. She developed her mixed media style after many years of painting with oil paint and experimenting with oil painting mediums. She maintains her studio in Baltimore, Maryland. In this conversation we get deep into her process- both technically and thematically.…

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Episode 26: Antonia Dolhaine - Shadows, Breathwork, and the Art in Healing from Trauma 1:08:09

4y ago1:08:09

1:08:09

Graduate of the National Circus School in Montreal, Antonia Dolhaine spent the last 4 years touring the world teaching and performing with the likes of Cirque du Soleil, Cirque Éloize, and Celebrity Cruises among others. Recently she ran away from the circus to run back to herself. Now a trauma-informed Breathwork facilitator and somatic practition…

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Episode 25: Aida Azlin - On Finding Beauty in the Everyday and Creativity During Ramadan 56:03

4+ y ago56:03

56:03

Aida Azlin is a writer, creative, proud believer, and dear friend of mine from Singapore. In this conversation, we cover quite a lot of ground. We talk about how Aida started writing, how it has changed over time, and her very specific routine that kickstarts her writing mode. We discuss how human connection is the most important thing in art and i…

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Episode 24: Kennedy Muntanga - Dancing at the Intersection of Stories, Culture, Passion and Faith 58:07

4+ y ago58:07

58:07

Kennedy Muntanga is a movement artist born in Ndola, Zambia where he resided until he was 7. Moving to Leeds (UK), Kennedy’s passion for movement came from his wholesome relationship between dance and culture. We discuss the intersection between his cultural heritage and dance, how narratives bring empathy to art, why he feels like he is still at t…

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Episode 23: Elin Kelsey - Why Hope Matters For the Environment, For Art, and During A Pandemic 1:00:45

4+ y ago1:00:45

1:00:45

Elin Kelsey, PhD is an award-winning author and internationally-recognized thought-leader for hope and environmental solutions. We talk about what led Elin to write and create children’s books specifically, as well as how to us books and art as vehicles for larger narratives and heavier conversations. We dig into her research process of writing a b…

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Episode 22: Vanessa Marian- On Groove Therapy and Cultivating a Strong Sense of Self 56:13

4+ y ago56:13

56:13

Training across New York, Paris, Berlin, London, Tokyo, Brazil, regional Australia, and her purple bedroom, Vanessa Marian Varghese is particularly fascinated with street dance and the way it is born outside of the dance studio context. In 2016 Vanessa founded Groove Therapy, aimed at making dance accessible to all walks of life. In this conversati…

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Episode 21: Anna Brones - On Women’s Wisdom and Examining the Cultural Value of Work 57:29

4+ y ago57:29

57:29

Anna Brones is a writer, papercut artist, illustrator, and producer living in the Pacific Northwest of the USA. She is the author of several books including Fika: the Art of the Swedish Coffee Break and Live Lagom: Balanced Living the Swedish Way. We speak in detail about her recent Women’s Wisdom Project, the cultural and societal values of work a…

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Episode 20: Natalia Fernandes - The Thinking Body & On Being Your Radical Self 1:03:46

4+ y ago1:03:46

1:03:46

Because this is my 20th official conversation on the podcast, it seems fitting that the artist I am speaking with is not only a dear friend and someone I have worked with in the past, but the woman who sparked the idea for this entire thing to begin with. Natalia Fernandes planted the seed of exploring deep process in my mind in 2015 when she direc…

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Episode 19: Akeisha de Baat - What Resilience Means as a Dancer, Athlete and Artist 56:47

4+ y ago56:47

56:47

Akeisha de Baat is contemporary dance artist turned online fitness enthusiast for dancers, based in Vancouver, Canada. She loves to create new works, self produce shows, and encourage other artists to go after their dreams. We talk about Akeisha's unusual path through dance, starting with roots in traditional Polynesian dancing as a link to her fam…

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Episode 18: Marouan and Ruby - Marriage: A Creative Collaboration 56:00

4+ y ago56:00

56:00

This episode is a little bit different from others. I decided to sit down with the one and only Marouan Ben Larbi, who is not only my husband, but at certain points throughout our relationship, a co-creator and fellow performer. In this conversation in our living room, the two of us go back and forth about topics relating to art-making, relationshi…

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Episode 17: Sharon Picasso - Slow-Cooker Creativity & Building a Sustainable Dance Career 50:27

5y ago50:27

50:27

Sharon Picasso is a Minneapolis based movement and interdisciplinary artist. Her creative work incorporates her rich background in dance, theater, somatics, music and design. She invests in cultivating an inclusive and sustaining creative environment and above all, values the process. In this episode we discuss her beginnings in theater and psychol…

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Episode 16: Hicham Gardaf - A Backwards Creative Process & Documenting Spatial Transformation 56:49

5y ago56:49

56:49

Hicham Gardaf is a photographer who was born in Tangier, Morocco, and is currently based in London. Gardaf’s work at its centre poses questions that investigate transformations of contemporary landscape, spatiality and politics of space. While he was back in Tangier for a brief trip home, I invited Hicham over for coffee and this conversation, in w…

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Solo Mini-Sode: Reflecting on the First Year of a Podcast in Process 16:50

5y ago16:50

16:50

A solo episode for the end of 2019 and the beginning of 2020, looking back on how I got started with this podcast, sharing how I prep for interviews, 3 major lessons I’ve learned in the first 9 months of podcasting, and gazing forward to the future. Full Show Notes Process Piece instagram Support Process Piece…

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Episode 15: Abigail Hing Wen - Dancing Through Writing Her Debut Novel, "Loveboat, Taipei" 51:51

5y ago51:51

51:51

Abigail Hing Wen was born in West Virginia and raised in Ohio as a child of immigrant parents, both of Chinese descent. She is the author of the bestselling YA novel Loveboat, Taipei. In this conversation, Abigail and I not only got into to process of how she wrote her wonderful book, but we connected on so many levels- as dancers, creative & intui…

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Episode 14: Ellen Humphreys - Crafting Characters & Questioning the Art in Acting 53:09

5y ago53:09

53:09

Ellen Humphreys is a New Mexico-based actress, originally born and raised in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Some of her past productions include In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play) by Sarah Ruhl, Home with a View of the Monster, and the films Outlaws Don’t Get Funerals, and Running with The Devil. In this conversation, we talk about her path to becoming the …

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Solo Mini-Sode: Intuition - A Common Thread in Creative Conversation 22:02

5y ago22:02

22:02

In this solo episode I’ve decided to begin to reflect on some of the common themes that keep coming up over and over again in my conversations with diverse artists. Namely, the power of intuition in the creative process. I cite past episodes where it has been discussed, try to define what intuition means, and tell my own story of listening to my in…

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Episode 13: Vie Boheme - "Your Life is Asking You to Stand Up" 55:48

5y ago55:48

55:48

Vie Boheme is a Motown native, blossomed in Pittsburgh and refined in Minneapolis. She is a multimodal artist; a dancer, singer and choreographer. Vie was singing in Casablanca in 2019 and I invited her to come hang out with me in Tangier for a weekend. We talked about everything from how she has explored heritage and history in her music and perfo…

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Episode 12: Caleb Hinz - Distortion, Project-Juggling, and Why “Art Changes Nothing” 54:44

5y ago54:44

54:44

Caleb Hinz is a musician, producer, t-shirt maker and artist from Saint Paul, Minnesota. Some of the highlights of what we covered in this conversation are chatting about how his artistic upbringing impacted his current work, the benefits of surrounding yourself with creative people in your life, how he juggles what seems like a million projects at…

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Episode 11: Sanne Clifford - A Maker of Movement Stories 57:45

5y ago57:45

57:45

As a self-proclaimed maker, Sanne Clifford uses the languages of dance, movement, words and film, choreographing them into moving stories and conversations. She is a Dutch artist and choreographer, living and working in Amsterdam and touring her work abroad. In this conversation between two choreographers in Sanne’s lovely Amsterdam apartment, we d…

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Episode 10: Shana Kaplow - Embracing Paradoxes in Painting and in Life 57:42

5y ago57:42

57:42

Shana Kaplow is a visual artist working with large-scale, ink-on-paper installation, sculpture, and video. Her images of mass-produced household objects peruse the familiar and the enigmatic confronting a society organized around ever-expanding consumption and exploitation. In this face-to-face conversation in Shana Kaplow's beautiful St. Paul stud…

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Episode 9: Yahia Lababidi - Practicing Faith in Art, Practicing Art in Faith 1:17:15

5+ y ago1:17:15

1:17:15

Yahia Lababidi is an Egyptian-Lebanese poet, writer, and aphorist. He grew up in Egypt, attended university in the states and eventually moved there later in life and is still based in Florida to this day. He has written several critically acclaimed books including his first book of aphorisms, Signposts to Elsewhere, a collection of poetry, Balanci…

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Episode 8: Radia Bakkali - Living and Breathing the Drama of Music 49:02

5+ y ago49:02

49:02

Radia Bakkali is a musical artist, pianist, composer, and teacher from Tangier, Morocco. In this conversation we talk about how she fell in love with the piano, composition as a way of expressing deep emotion, taking time and paying attention to details in your personal work, how artistic projects can connect you to your community and also how to a…

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Episode 7: Vinny Balbo - Freestyling + The Beautiful By-products 55:55

5+ y ago55:55

55:55

Vinny Balbo is an actor, dancer, and director living and making work in Los Angeles. We talk about what it is like to grow up in a big artistic family, the path to becoming a largely self-taught dancer and how to discover and craft your own style. We discuss the art of collaborations, his new project of short films and what that experience is teach…

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Episode 6: Houda Rahmani - The Necessity of Art + On Inspiration by the Sea 53:07

5+ y ago53:07

53:07

Houda Rahmani is a Moroccan artist, illustrator, graphic designer, and photographer living in Tetouan. In this face to face conversation in Tangier, we discuss the academic side of art and her experience of studying fine arts in Morocco, watercolors and visual arts as poetry, we talk about the paradox of instagram- how it can make us more self-cons…

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Episode 5: Jumana Al Refai - The World Through the Eyes of a Dancer 51:14

5+ y ago51:14

51:14

Jumana Al Refai is a professionally trained dancer and choreographer in ballet and modern dance based in Kuwait. She has over 20 years of experience and has trained, performed, and worked with internationally recognized dancers and choreographers. In this conversation, Jumana and I talk as two dancers living in countries where it is not traditional…

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Solo Mini-Sode: On Doubt as a Necessary Part of the Process 17:30

5+ y ago17:30

17:30

In this mini-sode, I discuss a topic that has been on my mind and present in my working life lately- doubt in the creative process. I explore how I believe it to be a necessary road block for us to learn to overcome, how I am personally dealing with it in terms of this very podcast, and I lay out some tangible ways that others can deal with their o…

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Episode 4: Renee Byrd - Soul of a Self-Aware + Sensitive Artist 55:51

5+ y ago55:51

55:51

Renee Byrd is based in a small town in Virginia and on her blog, Will Frolic for Food, she shares vegetarian recipes along with conversations about holistic wellness. She views self-care and personal healing as a vital part of living a full, creative life as an artist of any medium. As a musician, she is a part of the musical trio Larkspur and is s…

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Episode 3: Laura Jean - The Art + Heart of Travel 51:38

5+ y ago51:38

51:38

Laura Jean is a traveling artist living in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. She is writer, poet, photographer, podcaster and editor of Dame Traveler. Her blog, Roam + Go Lightly, was born in 2014 out of a simple travel diary to keep in touch with her family while she explored the greater half of EuropeWe dig into the original source of her wanderlust as we…

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Episode 2: Anne Butera - Seasons + Cycles of Creative Joy 44:48

5+ y ago44:48

44:48

Anne Butera is a self-taught artist living in Wisconsin who finds inspiration in the beauty of her garden and the magic of nature. In this episode, we discuss what it is to be self-taught and the pressure of calling yourself an artist in general, how these days we often feel like we have to share everything, the natural seasons and cycles of creati…

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Episode 1: Pau Aran Gimeno - Dancing with Fierce Love 41:20

5+ y ago41:20

41:20

Pau Aran Gimeno is a choreographer, dance teacher, and performer from Barcelona who is known primarily for being a longtime company member of Pina Bausch Tanztheater Wuppertal. He is now pursuing his own solo career as a creator and choreographer. In this conversation we go deep into his childhood influences and how they are present in his work tod…

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