Last Year’s SoftLaunch

Softlaunch in the Media

The Land: https://thelandcle.org/stories/20-performances-in-3-nights-cleveland-public-theatres-soft-launch-examines-how-theater-meets-art/

Ideastream Public Media: https://www.ideastream.org/arts-culture/2025-01-22/cleveland-public-theatre-and-theatre-166-go-outside-the-black-box

Pictured, Left to Right, Row 1: “Nonverbal Conversations,” “I Can See My House From Here,” “genesis,” “Behind the Veil,” “Sweeping Feathers;” Row 2: “Closed Loop of Consanguinity,” Gwydion Suilebhan, Sierra Delaine, Zelda Thayer-Hansen, Sherrine Azab, Nick Eaton, “Experiments in Exhaustion Technology;” Row 3: “Your Head Is on a Body That Is Not Your Body,” “Needle Drop,” Dayshawnda Ash; Row 4: “TEA: The Evolution Archive,” Jimmie Woody, Naomi Lord, Cassandra Ziemer and Erin Zoretich, Monique Donesia, Sullivan Ratcliff, “Windows to… or How to Stop SmoKing”

SoftLaunch is a weekend-long performance festival/conference that seeks nothing less than a complete reinvention of what theatre can be. Installation art, immersive and participatory performances, improvised music composition, and solo shows disguised as multimedia breakdowns and yoga classes—all these types of projects and more have found a home in SoftLaunch. The rule is: If your project does not fit the normal theatre mode, it belongs in SoftLaunch.

Audience members can wander as they wish to see different performance experiments that range from workshop to fully produced, and everywhere in between.

Check out the full lineup of SoftLaunch creators and performers, listed alphabetically by Lead Artist last name:

Lead Artist: Dayshawnda Ash (Day)
Title: Conditioned for Sale 
Performers: Day Ash, Rawn Chislton, Stuart Hoffman. Videography: iLoom Media. Artistic Vision/Editing: Day Ash.
Description: What is the value of Black bodies? Commentary & Commodification on the value, power & the price on being CHOSEN!
Lead Artist Bio: Dayshawnda Ash (Day) is a Cleveland-based actor and playwright whose work spans fiction, poetry, and performance, with a special focus on social and political horror. Drawing inspiration from lived experience and the world around her, Day crafts stories that explore the intersections of cultural history and contemporary issues. She is a member of Dobama Theatre’s Playwrights Gym (2025) and was recognized as Heights Arts Literary Artist of the Month in June 2024. Day’s work has been showcased at notable Cleveland institutions, including Cleveland Public Theatre. Her pieces My Skin (2021) and Green Bean Casserole (2021) were featured in Station Hope and Ten Minutes to Midnight. Green Bean Casserole was produced at Western Reserve Playhouse in February 2025, and No Exit: Curtain Call debuted in Cleveland Public Theatre’s Test Flight in February 2025. Day’s goal is to create stories that spark change in the world—because if you aren’t fixing something, you’re accepting it.

Lead Artist: Sherrine Azab
Title: Good Ancestors: Life Lines
Performers: A Host of People; Sherrine Azab & Jake Hooker
Description: Good Ancestors: Life Lines is a show in development that aims to make visible the invisible lines that connect us all. Through various modes of conversation with the audience, this multimedia performance investigates the connections, lineage, and influence we have on the people we meet throughout our lives and how they shape us.
Lead Artist Bio: A Host of People is a Detroit-based multi-racial theater company creating experimental multi-media theater for social change. Led by Co-Directors Sherrine Azab and Jake Hooker, they create original work that celebrates imagination, complexity, and the synthesis of seemingly disparate elements—at once epic and intimate, political and personal, poetic and approachable.

Lead Artists: Lila Rachel Becker & Denmo Ibrahim
Title: Secret Søciete & Portmanteau present genesis
Performers: Lila Rachel Becker & Denmo Ibrahim. Sound Composition: Meem Collective. Visual Designs: Leila Khoury.
Description: What does it mean to be a good stranger? Inspired by the stories of Sarah and Hagar, an early record of strangers in a strange land, genesis goes beyond scripture to reimagine what it takes to love thy neighbor. Through an intimate encounter made for one person at a time, experience the timeless experiment of friendship.
Lead Artists Bios: Lila, a director and writer, is the founder of Portmanteau and has worked in theatres all over the country. Her work in live performance is a rebellion against the pillaging of human attention by megacorporations and the increasing digitization of our lives. Denmo, a nationally acclaimed actor and playwright, created Secret Søciete to explore how devised work and ensemble practice influence social connection. She believes theatre is one of the few spaces where we can recognize the vital role of the collective.

Lead Artist: Raymond Bobgan and The Cleveland CORE Ensemble
Title: I Can See My House From Here 
Performers: Maddy Cox, Eric Wloszek, Nnamdi Okpala, Yuval Tal, Kalindi Stockton, Anastasía Urozhaeva. Costume Design: Anastasía Urozhaeva.
Description: The moon is the legendary land of dreams and the land of lost things. All the things we lose (keys, jewelry, courage, purpose) find their way to the moon. An experimental structured movement improvisation with texts illuminating meaning performed by audience members.  
Lead Artist Bio: The Cleveland CORE Ensemble, led by Raymond Bobgan, is dedicated to developing unique theatre practices, investigating the potential of the craft of acting, and creating a distinctive body of theatrical works. Raymond creates new performances that are bold, multilayered, and highly physical through an ever-evolving ensemble process. Raymond’s work has been seen in Romania, Brazil, Denmark, Serbia, South Korea, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and Canada, and has been featured in American Theatre, Canadian Theatre Review, and Theatre Journal.

Lead Artist: Sierra Delaine
Title: Loops Sessions: Live
Performer: Sierra Delaine
Description: Loop Sessions invites visitors to create an evolving soundscape by layering voices, rhythms, and textures in real time. Paired with a collaborative visual cover art wall, the installation becomes a living portrait of our shared emotion. Communal presence shapes an experience that grows and changes, revealing the sound of the night. 
Lead Artist Bio: Sierra Delaine is a Cleveland based musician, singer, songwriter, producer, and interdisciplinary artist working through sound, storytelling, and emotional connection. Using looping, improvisation, and voice, she creates intimate spaces for feeling and release. She is the 2025 Artist in Residence at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Lead Artist: Monique Donesia
Title: REd Room
Performer: Monique Donesia
Description: REd Room is a three day, slow-evolving live painting installation using body as brush and emotions as guide. As the room is stained red, audience members are challenged to witness visual expressions of violence, pain (personal and ancestral), and the ongoing struggle to shed what’s not yours to hold.
Lead Artist Bio: Monique Donesia is a Cleveland-based abstract visual artist whose work explores innovation through acrylics, found objects, and unconventional materials. Rooted in experimentation and curiosity, her practice draws inspiration from personal identity, nature, and community. Monique is driven by a commitment to push the boundaries of her artistry by reimagining the possibilities of available resources and techniques. She has showcased and curated work in her homegrown exhibition Cribzibit vol 1, and is a current 2025 Zygote Press PROOF Fellow. Her work has also been shown in Waterloo Arts’ Don’t Touch Me, Heights Arts’ Regional Perspectives, and has appeared in Edra Soto’s La Casa de Todos journal in collaboration with the Sculpture Center. In her role as an arts administrator, Monique merges creative vision with community centered programming. She manages programs that engage Black youth in the arts and leads collaborative art initiatives that support mental health, empowerment, and access to creative expression.

Lead Artist: Ryan William Downey
Title: Your Head Is on a Body That Is Not Your Body
Performers: James Earl Brassfield, Ryan William Downey, Dannie Horton, Nadia Pinder, Scott Ries, Alvie Wunder, Theresa Buchheister, Chrissy Reilly & Jeff Tobias
Description: An immersive haunted house of failure, identity, and getting your head sawn off. Observers navigate a disorienting space populated by confounding figures trying to figure. it. out. A psychedelic blend of horror, slapstick, and philosophical inquiry exploring the identities we adopt while navigating a senseless world. It’s a comedy.
Lead Artist Bio: Ryan William Downey is a multidisciplinary artist and founder of Hammer Beaten Sky, a multimedia collective creating pitch black psychedelic performance experiences. He served as Associate Artistic Director of The Brick in Brooklyn, NY, was awarded an OBIE in 2023, and his play, Sleeping Car Porters, was a New York Times Critic’s Pick. 

Lead Artist: Nick Eaton 
Title: Kip The Seer
Performer: Nick Eaton
Description: Guests are welcomed by a quirky stranger named Kip to encounter mystery with lightness. Through trinkets, stories from his journeys, and his gift of “noticing,” Kip weaves together a performance that reveals less about himself and more about the audience.
Lead Artist Bio: Nick Eaton is an award-winning magician, juggler, actor, and entertainer. He performs comedy variety shows all over Northeast Ohio and beyond. Known for his incredible close-up magic, wry smile, and charm, he’s delighted hundreds of audiences for over a decade. Find him on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube @nickeatonmagic.

Lead Artist: Aja Joi Grant (Mwt Het Heru Sa I Ba) 
Title: Behind the Veil
Performer: Kyra Frierson (Mwt Nekhbet Nfr Nurta T Ra) 
Description: To experience spirit is to feel it, listen to it, and breathe life into it. Action and devotion illuminate our connection to the spiritual realm, the realm of the ancestors. In traditional African diasporic religions and spirituality, the ancestors are seen as the first line of defense. The ones who came before us, who lived a good life on earth and continued their good work in the spiritual realm, protect and provide for their descendants. The actions of the ancestors shape our experiences today, as they assist from beyond the veil.
Lead Artist Bio: Aja Joi Grant is a photographer, printmaker, and fiber artist documenting Black American stories and visions on afro-surrealism, spirituality, liberation, and healing. She has shown work at Cleveland Print Room, Rooms to Let, Akron University, Worthington Yards & Cuyahoga Valley National Park Conservancy. Grant has been awarded 2025 Cleveland Arts Prize Verge Fellow, 2023 Karamu Room in the House Fellow, and 2022 Cleveland Foundation Equity in the Arts Fellow. She is an art educator with seven years of experience teaching photography and alternative process.

Lead Artist: Clifton Holznagel
Title: Experiments in Exhaustion Technology
Performer: Clifton Holznagel
Description: Experiments in Exhaustion Technology will study the relationship between freedom and survival. Join Clifton and a talking mannequin as we put our boundaries to the test, and submit your own data to the project. There will be music!
Lead Artist Bio: Clifton is an actor, musician, and video composer. He spent the last decade performing and making installations in Oregon, but Cleveland is home again. This past summer he had a great time working as a Teaching Artist for STEP at CPT. He gets his kicks partying in inconvenient places.

Lead Artists: Carol Laursen & emily liptow
Title: Closed Loop of Consanguinity
Performers: emily liptow & Carol Laursen
Description: The audience is invited to consider “to whom or what do you bow?” God/gods, finances, niceness, linear time, celebrities? The performers embody diverse forms of bowing, visceral and intimate. Weaving through expressions of dominance, surrender, submission and right-relationship, together we will explore sensation, meaning and the realm of devotion.
Lead Artists Bios: Carol Laursen & emily liptow have been dancing together for years. Their work is rooted in contact improvisation, physical and devised theater, vocal exploration, and contemplative practices. Carol holds an MFA in Acting from Ohio University, and Emily recently completed her MFA in Dance at Duke University.

Lead Artist: Naomi Lord & Rebecca Groth
Title: Are We Not Strangers?
Performers: Isaiah Burns, Kelly DiTurno, Rebecca Groth, and Sam Munro. Sound Design: CARAMEL (Angus K. Williams). Sound Operator: Wayne Smith III.
Description: Are We Not Strangers? is a participatory performance that feels like walking into a secret meeting. A chalk circle leads you to a basement room of strangers. There’s no stage, just invitations to unwrap everyday treasures, swap truths and practice real connection. Bring a line from a book that moves you. Will you be present?
Lead Artist Bio: Naomi Lord is a multidisciplinary artist whose work turns shared experience into civic action. She collaborates with communities to co-produce encounters that become artworks for social change: part ritual, part research, part rebellion. Her practice spans participatory theatre, immersive visual arts installations and cultural strategy in the UK and the USA.

Lead Artist: Martinique Mims 
Title: TEA: The Evolution Archive
Performers: Martinique Mims — Lead Artist/Archivist (Chaiya), Isaiah Hunt — Second Lead Artist (Pathfinder), KaShala Smith — Artisan (Nova Galaxy). Sound Engineer (Guardian of the Frequency): Josh Jacobs. Music Production and Soundscapes (The Frequency Keeper): Caramel.
Description: Feeling overwhelmed, distracted, or in need of a reset? Join us for TEA: The Evolution Archive, an Afrofuturistic lounge where Hybrids and Humans preserve the last echoes of humanity’s soul. Guided by the Tea Curator Nova Galaxy, guests receive personalized tea blends before exploring memory installations, vibrations, and encounters with Poet Archivist Chaiya. Take part in rituals of discovery, remembrance, and revival.
Lead Artist Bio: Martinique is a poet, performer, and teaching artist exploring the intersections of Afrofuturism, memory, collective healing, and human experience. She is excited to collaborate with Isaiah Hunt, professor and Afrofuturist scholar; KaShala Smith, entrepreneur and founder of Steeped in Pearl; and Josh Jacobs, a dancer, photographer, and visual artist in Cleveland.

Lead Artist: Sullivan Ratcliff 
Title: Portraits by Suttree 
Performer: Sullivan Ratcliff
Description: Portraits by Suttree elevates portraiture into performance. Take on the role of “the model” in the artist’s home, selecting props for your picture that engage him in a variety of reflective, humorous, poetic, or terrifying yarns. Questions and answers control the flow of the story as well as the completed portrait resulting in a unique splash page reflective of your time spent with Suttree, enkindling a spirit of improvisation and collaboration.
Lead Artist Bio: Sullivan is a Cleveland based actor from Valley City, Ohio. He primarily works out of Western Reserve Playhouse in Bath Township but has also performed at the Beck Center for the Arts, French Creek Theatre, Blank Canvas Theater, and Convergence-Continuum. A life-long storyteller, he is excited for the opportunity to experiment with combining acting, drawing and tale-spinning into one piece at Cleveland Public Theatre.

Lead Artist: Ramon Rivas II 
Title: Needle Drop
Performers: Stephanie Ginese — Guest Monologist & Improviser, TJ Maclin — Guest Musician, Monologist & Improviser, Dezhawn France — Guest Musician, Monologist & Improviser
Description: NEEDLE DROP moments in film/TV signify a sudden shift in narrative and emotion. Every 30-minute session will be a unique, organic experience that helps audience members arrive at their own needle drop realization. Exploring how sound informs feelings, thoughts and creative actions impact on your surroundings. Audience choices upon entering set the creative dominoes in motion.
Lead Artist Bio: An accomplished, acclaimed, accredited artist from Lorain, Ohio, Ramon Rivas’ poignant, thought-provoking work made national impact through specials on Comedy Central & HBO Latino, works across Sirius/XM comedy stations & appearances at festivals around the world. His artistry spans comedy, music, event production, community building, and writing across mediums.

Lead Artist: Diana Sette
Title: Sweeping Feathers
Performers: Dance: Genevieve Jencson. Paper Poppy Lead Artist: Anna Arielle Chapman & assistant Nicole Born Crow. Musicians: Yusef Naser, Gabe Ottoson-Deal, Donna Payravi, Chris Pinner, Cara Romano, Simon Mastri, Sean Seibert, Diana Sette. Sound Technician: Chris Pinner. Video Artists: Selma Babiker, Sara Fadlalla, Warda Hamdan, Alaa Muhammad, Noelle Naser, Shereen Naser, Dunia Jaffal, Chance Zurab, Estelle Raskin, Diana Sette. Puppetry: Miron Gusso (tech), Diana Sette (puppeteer/sound design/direction). Installation Design: Blandine Salukombo; Cleveland Sudan Network: Selma Babiker, Abeer El-Awad, Sara Fadlalla, Muna Haroun; Maryam Asraf, Diana Sette. Production Manager: Denis Griesmer.
Description: Sweeping Feathers invites guests into moments and places seemingly distant yet deeply interconnected, from Palestine to Sudan to Congo to the Amazon and back to Lake Erie. Cultivate poppies, explore the Refaat Alareer Library and Museum of Unspeakable Must-Speakables, and enjoy poetry, dance, and music as we sweep the feathers.
Lead Artist Bio: Diana Sette is a collaborative, decolonial, eco-socialist artist whose interdisciplinary work centers around highlighting everyday impacts of racism, colonization and war, while looking to Nature and inspiring yet-to-be-fully-realized possibilities. Her work as a dancer, musician, puppeteer, writer, and creator has privileged her to work across the U.S., Canada, Europe & Asia.

Lead Artist: Gwydion Suilebhan 
Title: Object Lesson
Performer: Gwydion Suilebhan
Description: In Object Lesson, audience members will manipulate twenty ordinary objects, re-ordering, grouping, and swapping them in response to meditative prompts. By collaborating, they will challenge the unspoken beliefs that underlie our material culture. Can we be objective about beauty? Value? Meaning? How can we work together to organize the world?
Lead Artist Bio: Gwydion Suilebhan is a playwright and cultural critic. His work has been commissioned and produced by Centerstage, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Gulfshore Playhouse, Workshop Theater, Forum Theatre, Theater J, and Theater Alliance. A founding member of The Welders, a Helen Hayes Award-winning collective in DC, Suilebhan also writes about comedy and politics with co-author Steven Gimbel.

Lead Artist: Zelda Thayer-Hansen
Title: Life as distraction as practice as discovery
Performer: Zelda Thayer-Hansen
Description: Throughout this endurance performance, Zelda cycles through a to-do list comprised of their most pressing tasks – many of which they fail to practice on a daily basis. Blurring the line between crippling internal expectations and confusing external obligations, creative practice morphs into a nonstop circuit of heightened productivity.
Lead Artist Bio: Zelda Thayer-Hansen is a Cleveland-born interdisciplinary artist working at the intersections of textile, illustration, sculpture, performance art, and collaborative research. Their works document the complexities of fleeting, repetitive human interaction, trans-embodied difficulties with binary systems in society, and discrepancies between habitual and innate senses of self.

Lead Artist: Anastasía Urozhaeva
Title: Windows to… or How to Stop SmoKing 
Performers: Katie Boissoneault, Hosea Billingsley; Eric Wloszek (voiceover). Sound Recording: Kite Davenport. Video/Footage: Michael Tekesky, Tessa Christine Smith, Daniel Lozada, Samantha Seawolf. Window Design: Leila Khoury. Lighting Design: Najada Davis.
Description: Interactive performance artwork interweaving a series of tales reflecting on immigration… real… imagined… This multi-room installation invites audiences to wander into each room of this museum of longing filled with fragments of history one can no longer really touch… Before leaving, the audiences are offered to leave a response.
Lead Artist Bio: Anastasía was born in Russia, now living in Cleveland, performing with CPT since 2018. Currently pursuing ongoing interest/research in exploring new interactive-installation-storytelling models that evoke experiences challenging what is possible within performance structures. This new work is created as part of CPT’s 2025–2026 Joan Yellen Horvitz Directing Fellowship for an Emerging Director.

Lead Artist: Selena Awesome Vicarío
Title: Nonverbal Conversations
Performers: Selena Awesome Vicarío, Alejandro Martinez Jr. (co-producer), “Roxy ‘Cuss‘” (RoxanaLaRouille), “Lucretia” (Allison DeWitt)
Description: Nonverbal Conversations is an interactive musical and performance installation exploring communication beyond words. Participants engage in small groups to discuss a chosen topic without speaking; instead using sound, movement, and other nonverbal means. The conversation is limited to approximately three mins in duration. Sessions are recorded and played back for reflection, and participants may provide short written feedback. Through these sessions, participants reflect on how emotion and intention are expressed and received beyond verbal language. Note: KN95/N95 masks will be required (and provided) in this installation space.
Lead Artist Bio: Selena Awesome Vicario is a Queer Boricua interdisciplinary performance & multi-medium artist, playwright, director, community organizer, activist and ethnobotany enthusiast. Founder of Peter Rabbit Project; Member of Teatro Público de Cleveland Leadership Committee; Advisory Committee member of Latino Environmental Collectivo. Selena draws from her personal experiences and knowledge from her community to inform her work toward building accessible, sustainable environments. 

Lead Artist: Jimmie Woody 
Title: Song for My Sisters: A Living Museum
Performers: Kevin Marr — Co-Lead Artist (Dancer and Choreographer), Renee Matthews–Jackson (Actor/Performer) , Jurnee Ta’Zion (Visual Artist/Performer), Suhaylah Hamza (Visual Artist/Performer) & Tamara French (Actor/Performer) 
Description: Song for My Sisters: A Living Museum is an immersive performance installation blending movement, visual art, poetry, and video projection. Rooted in the book of poetry by Abba Elethea/James W. Thompson, it forms a living Tree of Life that honors Black women’s past, present, and future through ritual, memory, and imagination.
Lead Artist Bio: Jimmie Woody is a multidisciplinary artist, director, actor, and educator whose work centers Black stories, memory, and community. With decades of experience across theater, film, and visual arts, he creates transformative spaces for dialogue, expression, and empowerment, guiding collaborative creative processes with vision, depth, and humanity.

Lead Artists: Cassandra Ziemer and Erin Zoretich
Title: The Machine
Performers: Erin Zoretich, Rylie Sage Hornung, Lucy Marchant, Emmett Podgorski, Eric Bartkowski, Brianna Williams, Kevin Ballou, Talya Ideozu, Nahomy Garcia, Jo Reid, Vivian Thomas, Andy Baker. Directed by Greenhouse. Written by Erin Zoretich. Designed by Cassandra Ziemer.
Description: The Machine is an immersive performance piece that challenges complicity in the (in)justice system. Peering past the emotionally charged 24-hour news cycle reveals banal legal violence. You will be immersed in “the machine” through a traumatizing yet mundane murder trial. The machine churns, whether we look or not. Will you look? Content warning: Transphobia, domestic violence, legal violence, police, emotional trauma. *Please wear a mask for the duration of this piece for the health and safety of our cast.*
Lead Artists Bios: Cassandra Ziemer (they/them) and Erin Zoretich (she/they) are brainstormers, writers, storytellers, and co-conspirators. Erin has been telling stories since she and her sibling were turning Lego mini figures into personalities when they were kids. Cas has been building things since they were tall enough to open the arts and crafts drawer.