Atlanta Ballet 2 Dancers

Meet the 21 | 22 Season Atlanta Ballet 2 Dancers

Santiago Bedoya is from Medellín, Colombia. He began his training at Andrea Wolff Ballet in his hometown at the age of 8. He then attended the summer intensive programs with Miami City Ballet from 2015 to 2017. At the age of 14 in 2017, he got a scholarship to a boarding school for the arts in L.A. called Idyllwild Arts Academy, so he decided to move there and start his high school studies along with his dancing. In 2018, he attended the Houston Ballet summer intensive program and got a scholarship for the full year. He attended their year-round program for three years. During his time at the Houston Ballet Academy, he had the opportunity to perform some works by Houston Ballet Director and Choreographer Stanton Welch A.M, as well as various performances throughout the year-round professional division.

Severin Brotschul, originally from Glen Arbor, Michigan, began his dance training in Maryland at age 13. He later studied with Denis Gronostayskiy and Anastasia Babayeva at School of International Ballet in Media Pennsylvania. He moved to Houston at age 16 to dance at Houston Ballet Academy. After two years in the professional levels, Severin danced with Houston Ballet II for the 2019/20 season. During his time at Houston Ballet Academy, he had opportunities to dance various works by Houston Ballet Director and Choreographer Stanton Welch AM, as well as many other esteemed choreographers.

Georgie Grace Butler is 22 years old and is from Atlanta, Georgia. She began her training at the Tolbert Yilmaz School of Dance. In 2015, she moved to Boston, Massachusetts, to train at Boston Ballet School. She trained as a pre-professional student and trainee with the company. She danced roles in Miko Nissinen’s The Nutcracker, Raymonda, and Miko Nissinen’s The Sleeping Beauty. In 2018, Georgie Grace became a trainee at Pennsylvania Ballet. There she danced roles in Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet, George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker, Angel Corella’s Giselle, and The Sleeping Beauty. She joined Atlanta Ballet 2 in 2019, and danced Yuri Possokov's The Nutcracker, Bruce Well's The Swan Princess, and August Bournonville's Napoli. She also had her choreographic debut in 2020 with No Ordinary Love that premiered at the Georgia Tech Arts: Skyline Series.

Ephraim Fowler is from Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, where he began his dance training at the age of 8. He was invited to compete at the Valentina Kozlova International Ballet Competition in 2015, where he finished third. He continued his pre-professional training and was fortunate to perform roles as Fritz, Prince and Cavalier in annual productions of The Nutcracker. He also performed as War in Coppelia, Puss in Boots in Sleeping Beauty and corps de ballet in Cinderella. In 2018, he competed at both Youth American Grand Prix and World Ballet where he placed fifth overall in the Pre-Professional Division and was invited to perform in the closing gala. That summer he attended Nashville Ballet’s Summer Intensive on full scholarship. In 2019, Ephraim began his Junior year at the South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities. While there, he performed roles in Sleeping Beauty and Coppelia. Ephraim joined the Atlanta Ballet family in the fall of 2020 to complete his Senior year as part of Academy V. He is excited to have been invited to join Atlanta Ballet 2and looks forward to performing.

Laura Gracia is excited to start hersecond season with Atlanta Ballet 2. She started dancing in Tomás Alvira School at the age of 4 and started studying dance in María de Ávila at the age of 9. Laura has had Lola de Ávila, Yolanda Plaza, Amador Castilla, Stefano Palmigiano, Antonio Ayesta and Mariangeles Bescos as teachers. She has also had the opportunity to learn repertoire and take classes in person from Gonzalo García, Jorge García, Arancha Baselga, Dores Andre, Paco Ruiz, Rubén Martín and Diego Cruz. In 2016, Laura danced The Game by Antonio Castilla. In 2018, she was a finalist in the Torrelavega competition with the Aurora Variation-Sleeping Beauty Act III and third Odalisque Variation of the Corsaire. In 2019, Laura danced Après un rêve by Amador Castilla at a gala in Reus, Spain. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree. After having the opportunity to dance with Atlanta Ballet 2 last season, Laura is really excited for the 2021|2022 season. She can't wait to learn and enjoy more and more here this season!!

Reira Ikeda is 17 years old, and from Iwate, Japan. Growing up in Singapore, she started dancing at age 3, and received her ballet training in Cheng Ballet Academy for 6 years, where she danced leading roles in full length ballet of Coppelia, Sleeping Beauty, Nutcracker and Swan Lake. Practicing under the Vaganova Method in school, Reira went to the Vaganova Academy in the winters of 2014, 2016 and 2017, and received further training in their style. She has also competed in many overseas competitions, such as the NBA Ballet Competition, Japan Ballet Competition, Youth America Grand Prix, Varna International Ballet Competition, and World Ballet Competition in which she was awarded a medal and scholarship to attend the 2019 Atlanta Ballet Summer Intensive, where she was given the opportunity to join Atlanta Ballet 2. Reira is very excited for her second season here.

Avery Jarrard, originally from Crestview, Florida, started dancing at age 8, attending the Northwest Florida Ballet Academy. In 2014 at age 12, he was accepted into Next Generation Ballet in Tampa, Florida, with a full scholarship and trained under Peter Stark, Philip Neal, Julio Montano, and Ivonne Lemus. Avery received first place for classical and contemporary at ADC/IBC in 2016, and then in 2018 received second place for classical and third place for contemporary. In 2016, he participated in the New York City Finals with YAGP. In 2018 he was accepted into Houston Ballet’s level Pro-2. While there, he performed with the second company in Stanton Welch’s Brigade. Memorable performances include Coppelia, Giselle, Swan Lake, Cinderella, and Balanchine’s Donizetti. Avery’s other creative passions include classical piano and composing. He attended the 2021 Film Scoring Academy of Europe summer program in Bulgaria.

Nae Kojima is from the Gold Coast, Australia, and began dancing at the age of 5 at Amanda Bollinger Dance Academy. At the age of 16, she moved to the U.S. to attend the Kirov Academy of Ballet in Washington D.C., where she trained in the Vaganova method and danced several principal roles. After graduating Kirov in 2019, Nae joined the Joffrey Ballet Studio Company in Chicago. There, she performed Fascinatin’ Rhythm from George Balanchine’s Who Cares?, works by Lar Lubovitch, and was also selected to perform in the main company’s The Nutcracker by Christopher Wheeldon. During the 2020/2021 season, Nae spent the year in her home country due to COVID-19 restrictions, and toured with the Projection Dance Company as a guest artist. Nae is very excited to be joining the Atlanta Ballet 2 for the 2021 | 2022 Season.

Margaret Kuefler is from Massachusetts. Her training started in 2006 at Acton School of Ballet. From 2016 to 2020, Margaret studied under Alexandra Koltun and Alex Lapshin at Koltun Ballet Boston. While at Koltun Margaret performed Sugar Plum Fairy, Dew Drop Fairy from The Nutcracker and Myrtha from Giselle. She also danced in Swan Lake, Don Quixote, and Sleeping Beauty. In addition to Koltun, she attended summer intensives at American Ballet Theatre, Chautauqua, and Pittsburgh Ballet. Margaret received third place at Youth America Grand Prix regionals in Boston in 2018, and continued on to Youth American Grand Prix finals in both 2018 and 2019.

Lucas Labrador was born in Cosquín, Argentina. He graduated from The Rock School in Philadelphia. Lucas won first place in the pas de deux category at the Youth America Grand Prix in Atlanta and second place in the ensemble category at the New York City finals. He spent two seasons at Ballet Nacional de Argentina, under the direction of Royal Ballet principal dancer Inaki Urlezaga. Lucas toured Argentina, Spain and Portugal, performing roles in Frederick Ashtons’s Birthday Offering, and William Dollar’s Le Combat, Giselle and La Traviatta. As a part of Atlanta Ballet 2, he has performed lead and starring roles in Bruce Wells’s Beauty and the Beast, Viktor Plotnikov’s World Premiere, Nadia Mara’s Apasionado and Tina Bohnstedt’s Eclipse. As an Atlanta Ballet apprentice, Lucas performed Ricardo Amarante’s The Premiere, Jiří Kylián’s Return to a Strange Land, Yuri Possokhov’s Don Quixote and The Nutcracker (Spanish, Russian and French), Johan Kobborg’s Sylphide (Pas de Six), Mark Morris’ Sandpaper Ballet, Liam Scarlett’s Catch and Vespertine, Claudia Shreier’s First Impulse, Kiyon Ross’ Sum Stravinsky, and Dwight Rhoden’s Sunrise Divine. Most recently, Lucas has performed as a guest artist, leading roles with Indianapolis Ballet in Sleeping Beauty, Raymonda, and Valse Fantaisie by George Balanchine.

Emmanuel López I started my training at the age of 12 at the Escuela Nacional de Danza Clásica y Contemporánea, where I danced corp de ballet and soloist roles in La Bayadere, Pas de peasant from Giselle and Masquerade from Rome and Juliet, etc, as well as in productions with the Compañía Nacional de danza such as, The Nutcraker and The Sleeping Beauty. In 2019, I move to London to train at the English National Ballet School until graduation in 2021. In my time at school, I performed Didy Velman’s Not so strictly, Frederick Ashton’s Les Rendezvouz, and more. I participated in the Festival Internacional de Danza Córdoba YAGP semi-finals in 2015 and 2017, where I got full scholarships to summer intensive programs with Orlando Ballet School, Joffrey Academy of Dance and Miami City Ballet School. In 2019, I won third place at the National Ballet Competition in Mexico.

Jason McClung moved to Washington, D.C., at the age of 13 to train at the Kirov Academy of Ballet. Jason has also trained year-round at Houston Ballet (Professional Division) and The Harid Conservatory (Senior Men’s class for 3 years). He has attended summer programs at Boston Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, The Royal Ballet School, Open World Dance Foundation in Estonia and Latvia, Boston Conservatory at Berklee (musical theater dance), and Atlanta Ballet. In 2016, he performed in American Ballet Theatre's Sleeping Beauty as Hop-o'-my-thumb at The Kennedy Center. Jason has performed in the roles of Fritz, Russian, Chinese, Prince and Young Drosselmeyer in various productions of The Nutcracker. He performed in the roles of Party Boy and Ninja Rat in Houston Ballet's premiere of Stanton Welch's The Nutcracker in 2016. In 2019, he performed in Mark Godden's premiere performance of Return, Return Again. Jason started training at Atlanta Ballet in January 2020, and in February he performed in Atlanta Ballet 2's production of Bruce Wells' The Swan Princess as a Prince's Friend. He is thrilled to start the new season with Atlanta Ballet 2.

Stephen Myers, from Chesterfield, Virginia, began dance training at the age of 5, and in a few years he was competing in all genres. At 16, he decided to focus on ballet and accepted a scholarship to train at Next Generation Ballet (NGB) in Tampa, Florida, under the direction of Philip Neal and Julio Montano. While training at NGB, Stephen continued competing and became a 2017 YoungArts Winner, a Youth American Grand Prix New York finalist at Lincoln Center, and a Top 5 finalist at the 2018 USA International Ballet Competition in Jackson, Mississippi. As a result of his performances at the USA International Ballet Competition, he was offered a traineeship with The Joffrey Ballet Academy in 2018, and was promoted to the Studio Company for 2019-20. Favorite performances include Cinderella, Coppelia and Balanchine’s Who Cares?.

Hui Wen Peng received her early training with Peiyu Wu and Meiying Lin in her hometown of Taichung, Taiwan. At age 15, she won the gold medal at Taiwan Grand Prix, where she received full scholarships to attend the Harid Conservatory and National Conservatory Dance School Lisbon. During her years at the Harid Conservatory, she performed several soloist roles and received the Dance Study Award. In 2017, Hui Wen was invited to join the pre-professional division at the Washington School of Ballet under the direction of Xiomara Reyes and Rinat Imaev. She was then promoted to the trainee position with the Washington Ballet under the direction of Julie Kent. In her first season with Atlanta Ballet, Hui Wen had the opportunity to perform alongside the Company in The Nutcracker, and in Atlanta Ballet 2's own production of The Swan Princess, choreographed by Bruce Wells. She is looking forward to her third season with Atlanta Ballet 2.

Evelyn Robinson is from the small town of Tyler, Texas, where she began her training at age 7 at Tyler Junior College Academy of Dance under Thereza Bryce-Cotes, Shurrell Wiebe, and Carolyn Hanna. At the age of 15, Evelyn began attending the University of North Carolina School of the Arts high school dance program on full scholarship. There she trained under Jennet Zerbe, Susan Jaffe, Eva Draw, Angelina Sansone, Jared Redick, Laura Martin, and many other UNCSA dance faculty members. While at UNCSA from 2017 to 2020, Evelyn danced principal roles in Ethan Steifel’s The Nutcracker, Frederick Ashton’s Symphonic Variations, Joseph Mazilier’s Paquita, Petipa’s Harlequinade and Sleeping Beauty, and Ilya Kozadayev’s Dream(s)pace. During her training, Evelyn attended Atlanta Ballet, Ballet West, UNCSA, Alonzo King Lines Ballet, Houston Ballet, and the Royal Ballet’s summer programs. In 2020, Evelyn competed at the Prix de Lausanne and was one of 21 dancers who moved to the finals. After graduating from UNCSA’s high school program in 2020, Evelyn joined Atlanta Ballet 2. She thanks all her teachers and family for their love, support, and guidance.

Kaitlin Matree Roemer is from Highland, Michigan. She began her ballet training at the age of 5 at Modern Messages Dance Company under the direction of Hollie Bottiglia, with whom she attended the Youth American Grand Prix (YAGP) Finals in New York City. In 2014, Kaitlin was accepted into the advanced pre-professional division of Ballet Detroit at the Detroit Opera House, directed by Sergey Rayevskiy, where she studied dance history, character dance and the Vaganova technique. During this time, she danced Ricordi, choreographed by Irma Cardano and later, traveled to Florida to dance in Katerina Fedotova’s Don Quixote as Kitri’s Friend, Swan Lake as Odette, and The Nutcracker’s Florida tour as Clara/Sugar Plum Fairy. She was also honored to represent Ballet Detroit in St. Petersburg, Russia, for the Dance Open Festival in 2018. Kaitlin joined Atlanta Ballet Centre for Dance Education’s Academy V and was awarded the Audrey B. Morgan Merit Scholarship. During her time in Academy V, Kaitlin had the opportunity to perform soloist and corps roles in Atlanta Ballet 2’s The Swan Princess by Bruce Wells and traveled with Atlanta Ballet to The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington D.C. to perform Yuri Possokov’s The Nutcracker. She is thrilled to begin her second season as a member of Atlanta Ballet 2, and thanks her loved ones for their support.

Samantha Schuermann is from Fort Knox, Kentucky, but grew up in the city of Cincinnati, Ohio. She began her dance training at Cincinnati Ballet before transferring to de la Dance Center (de la) when she was 7 years old. She‘s been training at de la for the past 11 years, where she has had the opportunity to perform both soloist and corps de ballet roles in full-length productions, such as The Nutcracker, Coppelia, Giselle, La Sylphide and Cinderella. She has spent summers training at Boston Ballet (2016), Next Generation Ballet (2017), American Ballet Theatre (2018-2019), and most recently, Atlanta Ballet (2020). Samantha attended an open audition for Atlanta Ballet in early 2020 in New York, where she was fortunate enough to have earned a position with Atlanta Ballet 2. She is looking forward to her first season here.

Covin Washington is 16 years old and was born and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. He began his dance journey at Moving in the Spirit, under the direction of Dana Lumpkin and Chris McCord, and then began his ballet training at Decatur School of Ballet. After receiving a merit scholarship through Atlanta Ballet’s AileyCamp at age 11, he joined the Centre for Dance Education in 2016. Two years later, he was promoted to Atlanta Ballet’s Academy and spent three years there before being asked to join Atlanta Ballet 2 for the 2021|2022 Season. During his time in the Centre, Covin has had the opportunity to be part of Yuri Possokhov’s The Nutcracker and Bruce Wells’ The Swan Princess, while also participating in the Atlanta Ballet’s Centre for Dance Education’s spring performances. Covin has been fortunate to receive full scholarships for summer terms and attend renowned ballet schools, such as Houston Ballet and San Francisco Ballet. He is extremely excited and honored to start his first season with Atlanta Ballet 2.

Photos by Kim Kenney.