MAGNUS WORKS is a continuous archive of Pompey's creative and choreographic visions. It is also an emerging, project-to-project-based platform that seeks to investigate various languages of movement and expression through the cultivation of conceptual work and its relationship to the humanity of audiences. Exploring the intent of movement, expression, and the vocabulary of anatomy, performer and audience consider the relativity of the physical, to that of reality. Using contemporary ideals and traditional devices, Magnus Works provokes the inquiry of modern-day perspective and aims to unite generations of audiences and collaborators. Constructing a family of movement artists, an eclectic collection of work, and interchangeable mediums from various artistic backgrounds, MW focuses on immersive presence amongst different generations of performers, sharing history through experience in space. This network forges collaboration and welcomes movement research, as well as other explorations of art and creative thinking. 

BiOGRAPHY

From Brooklyn, NY,  DAMANI POMPEY is a Caribbean-American independent interdisciplinary artist whose work emphasizes collaboration, world-building and choreographic visualizations. Inspired to alchemize movement practice through intentional narrative and spatial organization, his work roots itself in mind-body-spirit autonomy. His work seeks to expand dance and movement incubation through Black Future and radical community/ possibility. He is a director, filmmaker, choreographer, educator, lighting designer, writer and movement/ visual artist. He is the Director of Dance on HBO's Peabody Award-winning show, Random Acts of Flyness and is also the Movement Director for contemporary fashion’s Telfar.TV of Telfar Global. Pompey currently teaches the Choreography course for the prestigious Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School’s Dance Department. Recent credits include the historic Judson Memorial Church, MoMA PS1, Whitney Biennial, BET’s Queen Collective, and Denver Quarterly Magazine.

Pompey attended Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School for Dance, graduating with The Stefanie Silverman Award. He graduated Magna Cum Laude from SUNY Purchase’s Conservatory of Dance as an Adopt-a-Dancer in 2012, minoring in Arts Management. Pompey has performed repertory by Paul Taylor, Yvonne Rainer, Kanji Segawa, Crystal Pite, Pedro Ruiz, Nathan Trice, Ronald K. Brown, Colleen Thomas, Pat Catterson and Sarah Mettin amongst others. He has been commissioned for work at The Metropolitan Ballet Company (Philadelphia), The Harlem Stage Gatehouse, MoveNYC at Gibney Dance, Montclair High School (New Jersey), Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School, Brooklyn High School of the Arts and was also commissioned to present an evening length work for DLab Dance Company (Shanghai, China) in September 2014. He has also presented work at The American Dance Guild (2014). Two of Pompey's choreographed solos, "Felt" and "Whim" were awarded and recognized by the NFAA's YoungArts regional competition in January 2016. In 2017, Pompey worked with VR/TV/Film. Collaborative credits include AlJazeera (Sundance Film Festival 2020), The Ummah Chroma (Sundance Film Festival 2019), Big Vision Creative (LA Film Festival 2017) and BET’s Queen Collective (Tribeca, Sundance, Pan African, African-American Film Festival 2023). His first independent work “SAMARITAN,” premiered Summer 2019, in collaboration with Studio INI & A/D/O supported by Mini X BMW. Pompey is the recipient of Kaatsbaan’s 2020 Spring Upstream Residency Award.