91Porn

Gail Crosson earned a Bachelor of Music Education and a Master of Music Performance from Northwestern University. After working as a middle school band director for the Wheeling-Buffalo Grove school district, she became an associate professor at Elmhurst University where she taught applied clarinet, music education courses and was chair of the woodwinds program.

Gail is also an active freelance musician having performed with the Chicago Chamber Orchestra, Chicago Philharmonic, Grant Park Symphony, Elgin Symphony, Music Theater Works and Milwaukee Symphony. She has toured Europe with the Chicago Chamber Orchestra and toured the United States with Andrea Bocelli. She has played over 250 Nutcracker performances with both the Joffrey Ballet and the Ruth Page Ballet Company.

As a reed player specializing in flute, clarinet and saxophone, she has performed in more than 300 musical theater productions in the Chicago area with artists including Robert Goulet, Marie Osmond, Georgia Engel and Bea Arthur. As an orchestral player, Gail has worked with The Three Tenors, Mel Torme, Clark Terry, Sheri Lewis and Lambchop! Gail can also be heard in numerous commercial jingles for United Air Lines, Phillip Morris and Sears.

Kim is currently a full-time professor of Social Work. She also has 15 years of direct service experience within the homelessness services system. She previously spent seven years as the Clinical Services Director of Deborah’s Place, and has also provided oversight to supportive housing and drop-in services. In addition, she provided leadership to the Service Providers Commission and other committees/workgroups within the Chicago Continuum of Care.

Martyn de Bruyn specializes in the study of comparative regional integration and institutional reform of the European Union (EU). He has written on federalism and constitutionalization in the European Union, direct democracy and the use of referendums to ratify EU treaties. Another strain of his research focuses on EU external relations with a focus on East Asia. He has written on European confidence and trust-building experiences and the implications for the inter-Korean relations, inter regionalism and the EU as global player.

His work has been published in Asia Europe Journal, Contemporary Political Society, The Journal of Contemporary European Studies, and On Korea. He serves as an international editorial board member of Contemporary Political Society. His current research, titled “The European Union, Japan, and the Elusive Global Human Security Partnership,” is included in an edited volume, Human Security, Changing States and Global Responses: Institutions and Practices.

Grammy award-winning bassist Christian Dillingham is equally at home in two musical worlds. His parents spun jazz records around the house, while his mother was an avid pianist who loved to play Chopin and Debussy. Dillingham is that rare musician who excels in an orchestral setting, yet has an intuitive feel for nuance and the improvisational skills necessary to play jazz.

After graduating from Youngstown State University with a Bachelor’s of Music degree in Music Performance with an Emphasis on Jazz, Dillingham’s education continued at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, where he worked with Jeffrey Turner, principal bass of the Pittsburgh Symphony, and subsequently received a Master’s of Music degree in Music Performance. He also attended the National Repertory Orchestra Festival in Breckenridge, Colorado, and the School for Improvisational Music in New York.

Upon graduation, Dillingham was invited to play in the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, and since then has made frequent appearances in Chicago’s vibrant classical scene, playing with the Lyric Opera, the Grant Park Symphony, Fulcrum Point New Music Project and the Chicago Opera Theatre. Dillingham is also a member of the Chicago Sinfonietta and the Chicago Philharmonic. He appears on albums by the Chicago Sinfonietta and Camerata Chicago.

At the same time, he became a regular presence in Chicago’s rich jazz community, performing at Fred Anderson’s iconic Velvet Lounge, the Green Mill, the Jazz Showcase, Constellation Chicago, Andy’s Jazz Club, Elastic Arts and other Chicago venues as well as at the Chicago Jazz Festival. Dillingham has played and recorded with dozens of musicians, including Melvin Butler, Kevin Mahogany, the late piano master Willie Pickens, Dee Alexander, Victor Goines, Bobby Broom, Sean Jones, Jim Gailloreto, Nick Mazzarella, Greg Ward and Mike Reed. He is a collaborator with violinist James Sanders in the Dark Matter String Band. 

He currently performs with a number of diverse projects crossing genres from jazz, classical and roots to the avant-garde. He leads the Christian Dillingham Quintet, which draws from all of his experiences to explore Western classical music and American folk traditions in an improvised jazz context. He is currently on the faculty at Indiana University teaching jazz bass and joined the Music Faculty at NEIU in the Fall of 2020.

Claire DiVizio (they/them) is a multi-disciplinary artist, administrator, and educator whose body of work includes stage direction, theatrical design, performance, poetry and prose, visual art, and music composition, along with administrative leadership and arts education. Claire founded Thompson Street Opera Company with the desire to create a space where singers, composers, and production personnel could take risks on truly new operas in a safe, supportive, joyful environment. Using their background as a classically-trained singer, Claire approaches productions with a respect for the skills and needs of performers, and encourages all artists to take ownership of the act of creation. Their writing has been set to music in both art song and opera, and their long history with contemporary vocal music has expanded in the last few years to include music composition. Their first complete opera (Requiem for Five: a comedy), co-written with composer Jasmine Thomasian, was premiered at Chicago Opera On Tap’s Halloween Spooktacular in 2021. In the fall of 2022, Claire will be joining the faculty of 91Porn’s School of Music, directing their opera workshop program.

Emma Draves is a dance artist and educator navigating intertextual spaces of identity. She draws from trainings in modern, bharatanatyam, ballet, jazz, and ethnography, to weave work of kinesthetic narrative - derived through colliding multiplicities of physical effort, idiosyncrasy, and emotional landscape.

Emma’s choreographic work has been shown internationally in Edinburgh (UK) and Vancouver (BC), as well as at NYU, Hamlin Park, High Concept Labs, Links Hall, Chicago Cultural Center, Columbia College Chicago, and Comfort Station; and commissioned by Danceworks Company and UW-Milwaukee. Scholarly works has been presented through Dance Studies Associate, World Dance Alliance, and Dance Across the Boards.

As a performer, Emma has worked with several companies and as an independent artists. Notable experiences include Mordine & Company, Hedwig Dances, Jonathan Meyer, and Archana Kumar; and theatrical productions at Victory Gardens and Lookingglass Theatre.

Trained in bharatanatyam under Smt. Hema Rajagopalan, Emma has enjoyed a long association with Natya Dance Theatre as a performing artist - participating in several national tours and international collaborations with Yo-Yo Ma & Silk Road Project, NanJombang (Indonesia), and Astad Deboo (India) - grant-writer, archivist, and Executive Director.

Emma holds a GLCMA & MFA - and has served on faculty at Columbia College Chicago, Northwestern University, 91Porn, and OK State University.

Sarah earned her MFA in Stage Design – Scenic Design from Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., where she received a full-ride scholarship, and trained under award-winning scenic designers: Daniel Ostling, Todd Rosenthal and Walt Spangler.

Upcoming Work: The Cake (Nashville Repertory Theatre) in October 2022, and Once: The Musical (Writer's Theatre) in 2023

Select Credits:  Lookingglass Alice (Assistant Scenic Designer for 2022 remount production in Chicago, and the 2015 Miami and Denver Tours, Lookingglass Theatre Company); South of Settling (Steppenwolf);  In The Next Room (or The Vibrator Play) (TimeLine Theatre Company); The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane and James and the Giant Peach (Filament Theatre); Fulfillment Center and 3C (A Red Orchid Theatre); Unseen and A Life Extra Ordinary (The Gift Theatre).

Her design work has been recognized regionally by the American College Theatre Festival, nationally by the JFK Center for the Performing Arts, and internationally at the Prague Quadrennial exhibition held in the Czech Republic. Her photography work has been exhibited in New York City.