Lady Dane Figueroa Edidi
Dubbed the Ancient Jazz Priestess of Mother Africa, Lady Dane Figueroa Edidi is a Nigerian, Cuban, Indigenous, American Performance Artist, Author (Yemaya’s Daughters, Brew, Baltimore: A Love Letter, Wither, Remains: A Gathering of Bones, Keeper, Bone, The Blood of A Thousand Roots, Incarnate, and For Black Trans Girls Who Gotta Cuss A Motherfucker out When Snatching an Edge Ain’t Enough: A Choreo Poem, Solace), Teacher, Choreographer, Oracular Consultant, Spiritual Life Coach, Priestess, Speech Writer, Writing Coach, Advocate, Healer, playwright (For Black Trans Girls, Guilty,Absalom, and Klytmnestra: An Epic Slam Poem which will be receiving a world premiere at Theater Alliance in May 2019).
She is also is the book writer and lyricist for Roaring the Musical, which is about a Black Trans Singer and her family in the 1920s Harlem.
She is a Founding Member of Force Collision, an Entangled Artist at Spooky Action Theater and a 2x Helen Hayes Award Nominee (2016, 2018).
She is the founder of The Inanna D Initiatives, which curates, produces and cultivates events and initiatives designed to center and celebrate the work of TGNC Artist of Color.
Considered one of the most prolific artist of our time, she is the first Trans woman of color to be nominated for a Helen Hayes Award (2016), in DC to publish a work of Fiction (Yemaya’s Daughters (2013)), and chosen for Theater Alliance’s Hothouse Festival, having her play Absalom read at the Kenney Center’s Prelude Festival.
In 2015 she received an emerging Leader Award for her work with the D.C. Trans Community and is the GLBT History Project’s 2018 receipt of the Mujeres en el Movimiento Arts Award.
She has also costarred as Patra in the new web series King Ester.
She is co-editing the Black Trans Prayer Book (#BTPB).
She is on the committee for Not In Our House DC and is their Media Coordinator.
From Baltimore Maryland, and growing up singing jazz, she has been utilizing art as a tool for healing, revolution and collective liberation since she was a child, giving birth to several arts advocacy initiatives.