CAMILA ARANA
CAMILA ARANA GOES SOLO
2025 GHOST LIGHT ARTIST INTERVIEW
CAMILA ARANA (she/her) is a queer, Cuban-American choreographer, movement director, and dancer originally from Miami, FL where she graduated from New World School of the Arts/ University of Florida with a BFA in Dance Performance. She’s worked on tours, music videos and editorial shoots, helping bring creative ideas to life while incorporating abstract and dynamic movement. Camila has worked with dance companies like Ate9 Dance Company, Mike Tyus & Co., Clairobscur Dance Company, and Acts of Matter. Some examples of music artists she’s worked with are Grammy-winning, Miley Cyrus and Kali Uchis, Foster the People, and Alessia Cara. She’s modeled and movement directed for brands such as Ralph Lauren, Bowflex, Apple, and Adidas. Aside from her dance career, she’s a certified personal trainer, pilates instructor and stretch therapist.
She is the eleventh GHOST LIGHT RESIDENCY artist.
“I worked completely backwards from what I’m used to doing and it gave me more information than I expected.”
- CAMILA ARANA
BEMOVING
What were some of your goals or intentions coming into this week for your residency at the Alex Theater? Was there anything that you learned or experienced inside that time that felt new or unusual?
CAMILA ARANA
Right off the bat, I've never choreographed a solo by myself. I also haven't done a solo since I was probably too young to be doing solos, but I wanted to just challenge myself to dive into my own work and to kind of hold myself accountable to sit with it.
I feel like I learned so much in that week. Notably, just how different the creative process is alone versus with a group or ensemble.
Going solo, I worked completely backwards from what I’m used to doing and it actually gave me more information than I expected. I came into the residency with a challenge for myself that wasn’t a fully articulated concept, but diving into that idea and allowing the theater to inform my approach gave me a lot of new material.
BEMOVING
And how did the space itself influence that series of discoveries?
CAMILA ARANA
It’s like I was told at the beginning of the week — the space has turned into my home. The first few days when I walked in, I felt like an ant. I kept asking myself, “How do I fill up this enormous space?” That led me to question where I wanted to exist within the theater and identify where I felt most scared or uncomfortable, and try to find a balance between those two feelings.
BEMOVING
How is that different from your usual process?
CAMILA ARANA
I don't have a formula that I go by, but I love to work with other dancers. I love work that has a lot of bodies in it and I have the kind of ADHD where working with an ensemble helps me be more detailed. I have to slow myself down so I can communicate with other people.
In a way, that's the only thing that has stayed consistent in my process, and because I didn’t have anyone who I had to translate my ideas to, I’ve been able to let myself ramble and experiment.
There were many moments where I had to just accept being alone and say, “Okay, this is just how it’s gonna be.” At first, that felt backwards, but then I started to get used to working at a quicker speed.
Like I said, this was the first time I’ve ever choreographed something where I came in without a game plan.
I didn’t even really have an idea, just words I kept repeating in my head before coming in here and a strong sense of how much I hate solos. And that contradiction was nerve wracking because I always have some shape of a plan or image in my head about how the work is going to move. This time, I didn’t have any of that, and it became clear very early in the residency that I was in new territory.
BEMOVING
How did your access to lighting and tech affect your process?
CAMILA ARANA
Being in new territory also meant new resources. I was able to work with Cody Mackenzie, the incredible lighting designer at ALEX Theatre, throughout the week. Being able to experiment with lights on day one and then already have an idea of how I wanted to stage things on day two before I even had music or choreography meant that I was able to work within a set design and evolve the piece around the setting I created. And that part of the process is usually last, very, very, last.
Because of that change in process, the lighting has been so important. I would almost say it feels like the most important aspect of building the new work because it amplifies the narrative I have going on internally throughout the solo. Because of the size of the ALEX, I was able to test how far Cody can take the lighting across the space, on and off the stage. It creates this cat and mouse chase between the three of us – me, the dancer, Cody handling lights, and the audience – where Cody and I are chasing each other back and forth in the theater.
From there, the music has been another important aspect. I was lucky enough to have my partner, Ale Roubini, help me create a sound score that’s been really fun. We were able to experiment with sound cues and adding moments of silence.
With those elements, we were able to slowly adjust all week. And as I say this, I recognize that I wasn’t exactly alone, but I was definitely channeling my own thoughts and inclinations.
“It feels good to know that tomorrow I’ll be a different person and the work can accommodate that change and grow with me”
- CAMILA ARANA
BEMOVING
How did you handle the idea of having space without the requirement to have a finished product?
CAMILA ARANA
At first that felt really overwhelming because there wasn’t an obvious limit on what I was allowed to do. I remember during the initial meetings about the residency, I was asked if I wanted to reserve a dressing room so I could play with staging the work there.
Getting that offer made me realize how dependent I am on someone giving me limits or instructions. It was really difficult when I didn’t know what I was going to do. But it also made me realize that there is a perfection side to these feelings and that what I was really desiring was something like a bow to put on the work that would make it feel good enough. Now that the pressure has been taken off and the work has evolved, I’m more able to accept the idea that the work is still in progress and that it will keep changing and growing. It feels good to know that tomorrow I’ll be a different person and my soul will be in a completely different place, but the work can accommodate that change and grow with me.
BEMOVING
Yes, the endlessness of our practice! Was there a particular aspect of the residency program that contributed to your internal reflections on the creative process?
CAMILA ARANA
That’s a hard one. Probably breaking the soft formula that I had in my mind where I start with a choreographic motif or phrasework then add music to see how it moves in context. It’s not even that I always or necessarily choreograph to music, but music is usually a driving force in my creative process.
Like I said, my brain always thinks about lighting and set design last. Because of that, I tend to get overwhelmed by the idea of props and tend to think of lighting as a prop. Having access to the theater throughout the beginning of my creative process meant that I was able to expand the way I approach making work and try an entirely new sequence for composing.
“Having access to the theater throughout the beginning of my creative process meant that I was able to expand the way I approach making work and try an entirely new sequence for composing.”
— CAMILA ARANA
BEMOVING
Having completed the residency, what are you looking to accomplish with your work or as an artist that’s different from before?
CAMILA ARANA
I’m still figuring that out for sure, but there are a few threads where I’m starting to see patterns. On the one hand, I’m really thinking through what it means to be a movement artist. How athletic we can be. How we can exhaust our bodies. When we’re performing, it’s almost like we’re aliens or cats and we can defy gravity.
In terms of quality of movement, I just love a lot of physicality being present in my work and being sensitive to how movement can convey feelings like humor even when a work is thematically dark or serious.
Taking a step back, I’m a Latin and queer artist, which doesn’t mean that my work is always about those identities. But it does inform my existence and what I bring into my work unconsciously. And even when I don’t tap into those identities, it doesn’t feel right to have a performance where there isn’t some kind of little romantic two-step mixed in.
BEMOVING
So do you still hate solos?
CAMILA ARANA
No, I don't hate solos, but I think the residency really reaffirmed that I don’t like to do things alone. I love collaboration and process and feedback and giggles during rehearsals too much – I think working as a group is the whole point.
I appreciate that GHOST LIGHT RESIDENCY gave me space to mess up and research and discover those things about myself. It’s not just literal space and time, but also being able to walk into a space and completely remove myself from the outside world without worrying about things like finances or even just annoying my downstairs neighbors. The residency really gave me the opportunity to dive into my practice without judgment.
GHOST LIGHT RESIDENCY is a program of BEMOVING
All photos taken by Slade Segerson
WATCH AN EDITED CLIP FROM CAMILA’S RESIDENCY HERE!
This 2025 program was made possible thanks to support from the ALEX Theatre, the California Arts Council, and the KHR McNeely Family Foundation.