BUILD THIS HOUSE
Presented by MOCA and Banjee Ball Foundation
Featuring Ballroom We Care, Isaiah Victor, Isla Cheadle, Kevin JZ Prodigy, Purple Crush, and Michael Roberson

For over a decade Banjee Ball (founded 2013 in Los Angeles) has been a cornerstone of L.A. Ballroom–from their early days at the Standard Hotel in Downtown LA, to balls at colleges across California, Pride stages, and cultural institutions. Opening the door for HBO Max’s Legendary, Banjee Ball connects Ballroom with Hollywood, the art world, and education. Celebrating its 11th anniversary, Banjee Ball transitions from being solely an event series to the newly formed Banjee Ball Foundation. In partnership with MOCA, Banjee Ball Foundation presents a weekend of community building workshops, performances, and of course, a Ball.

SCHEDULE
Friday October 4th 2024
5pm: Poetry Reading with Icon Kage Herve Lever
5:15pm: The Workshop: Ballroom History, Healing Trauma, and Building Healthy Community Led by Michael Roberson with Michael Haynes of Ballroom We Care and Tovi Scruggs-Hussein
7:15pm: Performances by Rome Ebony, Purple Crush, Zay Basquiat, and Kevin JZ Prodigy
7:30pm: LSS "Legends Statements and Stars" by Icon Enyce Gucci, Precious Basquiat, and Legendary J Rock Ebony

Saturday October 5th 2024
5pm Onwards: BUILD THIS HOUSE BALL

Isla Cheadle is a music and dance artist, record label owner, event promoter, voguer, and Ballroom House leader/organizer. With almost 20 years of experience in entertainment, she has toured the world performing dance music with her husband under the name Purple Crush. Purple Crush has released collaborations with artists such as Ru Paul Drag Queens Raja and Eureka O’hara, rapper LE1F, Ballroom/House producer Vjuan Allure (RIP) and Ballroom commentator Icon Kevin JZ Prodigy (Beyonce, Madonna).

It was through LA’s underground drag scene that Purple Crush found the Ballroom community, and in 2013 they started a Ballroom event called Banjee Ball, now one of the staples of the West Coast Ballroom scene. As a voguer formerly in the House of Chanel, and now House of Ebony, Isla has acquired numerous trophies and “OTYs” state to state winning “Woman Voguer of the Year” in New York City in 2017. She has held multiple leadership positions for the House of Ebony, Godmother, Mother, and now West Coast Director. In 2020 she was “Mother Ebony” on Season 1 of Legendary on HBO Max and then Purple Crush went on to be Music Directors for Season 2 and 3. In 2022 she was deemed “Legendary” for Women’s Performance at the renounced Latex Ball in NYC.

As the founder of Banjee Ball, a prominent voguing event in Los Angeles, Isla is an advocate and student of its history - Ballroom began as an underground culture in Harlem in the 1960s designed as a safe creative space for Black and Latino LGBTQ people. Balls, as the communal events are called, are competitions with multiple highlighting categories such as vogue dance, runway, and face, each with a trophy and cash prize. Participants compete, or “walk,” with “Houses.” These collectives act as both teams for the competition and as chosen families for many disenfranchised youth.

Ballroom found its way to Los Angeles in the 90s, and thrived insularly. However, it struggled to survive outside of the underground spaces largely due to the racial and economic separation inherent in the sprawl of the city. Banjee Ball has been able to act as a bridge between the downtown LA nightlife and the Ballroom community, and has served as an intersectional hub for the past 7 years. As Ballroom and Voguing gain exposure in the media, Banjee Ball continues to act as a bridge for the community by making spaces for Ballroom in education, the art world, and activism. Banjee Ball has teamed up with LA County, LA LGBT Center, The Broad Museum, MOCA, UC Santa Barbara, CalArts, Cal State Long Beach, The City of West Hollywood, DTLA Proud Festival, and Pride Festivals for LA, Seattle, Tacoma, and Palm Springs. Banjee Ball’s mission is to create events, presentations and educational workshops that focus on developing and sharing Ballroom culture while providing tools for physical and mental health to its participants.

Michael Roberson is a public health practitioner, advocate, activist, artist, curator, and leader within the LGBTQ community. He is the co-creator of the nation’s only Black Gay Research Group and National Black Gay Men’s Advocacy Coalition, as well as an Adjunct Professor at The New School University/Lang College NYC, and Union Theological Seminary NYC. He is an international art and politics consultant and a member of the international sound art collective entitled “Ultra-red.” Michael is the Senior Scholar in residence for the Center for Race, Religion, and Economic Democracy, as well as a 2019 TED Media Resident, where he performed a global TED talk about the underground Black/Latinx House/ball ballroom community, entitled The Enduring Legacy of Ballroom. For Black History Month 2021, Michael co-authored an article in Time Magazine titled "Why Voguing and the Ballroom Scene Matter Now More than Ever." Michael also co-created a “Respect in The Workplace” curriculum and training for Vice Media, and trained all of Vice’s staff in their Brooklyn offices and Los Angeles offices. Additionally, Michael served as a cultural consultant for Pose on FX. For two years, Michael was a public health advisor and community engagement specialist for the NYC COVID-19 contract tracing initiative. Michael is both the Series Editor of the online international publication Arts Everywhere Ballroom Freedom School section as well as the ITP Director of the Invoking the Pause Climate Challenge National Cohort for the San Francisco based Clean Energy Leadership Institute. Michael serves as a Cultural Ambassador for City Lore’s Creative Traditions Residency Program by means of engaging in ethnographic research, audiovisual documentation, and program planning focused on the NYC Metro area’s House Ballroom community, artists, and events.

Educational components and workshops related to BUILD THIS HOUSE are funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Ending the HIV Epidemic Grant and the County of Los Angeles, Department of Public Health, Division of HIV and STD Programs.

Wonmi’s WAREHOUSE Programs is organized by Alex Sloane, Associate Curator, and is produced by Amelia Charter, Producer of Performance and Programs with Michele Huizar, Programming Assistant, The Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles.

BUILD THIS HOUSE is presented at MOCA as part of Wonmi’s WAREHOUSE Programs founded by Wonmi & Kihong Kwon and Family.

Performances at MOCA are supported by the MOCA Fund for Performance with generous funding provided by Betsy Greenberg.