The Breeze and The Sunbeam: How Two Friends Made Halo-Halo by Ashayla Byrd

The Breeze and The Sunbeam: How Two Friends Made Halo-Halo

by Ashayla Byrd

Jadyn Brick & Luisa Lynch

Jadyn Brick (@jadynbrick) & Luisa Lynch (@luisalynch) : Halo-Halo: Mixed-Mixed (@halohalo.mixedmixed)

Atlas Performing Arts Center

February 28th, 2025 7:00 pm

Audio version below

(Cover photo by Laura Quintero (@its.laurajquintero))

Jadyn is a gentle breeze that compels blades of grass to sway, nudging crisp dewdrops down from the blades’ tips toward thirsty soil. We interned together at Dance Place in northeast DC before I went full-time. A Dickinson College alum, they were probably one of the only people I knew that could tastefully rock a mullet. A calm, soothing spirit, they handled Dance Place’s constantly energetic kids like an expert kitten-wrangler. 

I liken Luisa to the first beam of glowing sunlight peeking through clouds as a new day dawns. I met her after I began working at Dance Place full-time. She started volunteering there after graduating from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, PA and then taking some time off. Always warm and ever-open, she expressed a desire to connect with DC’s dance scene and to find a new dance home. May UArts rest in power. 

Together, the gentle breeze and the warm sunbeam created Halo-Halo: Mixed-Mixed, an evening-length duet that reflects on and honors their experiences as mixed-race individuals. Halo-Halo (pronounced hah-lo hah-lo) directly translates to “mix-mix” in Tagalog, the primary language spoken in many regions of the Philippines. At the earlier stages of their friendship, post-dance class car rides led them to discover that they both share mixed-race, Filipino heritage, and they desired finding a creative outlet to convey the nuances of their lived experiences. 

Evading the curious noses of my kittens over dinner at my house, Jadyn recounted the first rumblings of the Halo-Halo universe: 

“Here’s what I remember: For some reason…I was describing Malta because my older sister lives in Malta, and then you were like, ‘Oh, that reminds me of some small islands in the Philippines. And I was like, ‘Oh, why were you in the Philippines?’ And then you were like, ‘Oh–da, da, da–I’m a quarter Filipino.’ And I was like, ‘That’s very specific.’ And then I was like, ‘I’m also a quarter Filipino.” 

Luisa had to jump in:

“And then, I was like, ‘Okay, do you know what part of the Philippines your family is from?’ And it turns out our grandparents are from the same island. The same place.”

There are 7,641 islands in the Philippines, and only 2,000 of them are officially inhabited. I learned that from Jadyn. Kismet? I think yes. Their grandparents were from the same island. They have mutual family friends, and the connection was only realized when they came together.

Luisa and Jadyn had already built a trusting, honest, and vulnerable friendship with one another, and so began their journey into creating Halo-Halo: Mixed-Mixed. 

Luisa admitted to feeling lost when she first arrived in the DC area. She wrestled with feeling disconnected from dance while still yearning for that sense of community. After dancing with Jadyn in a large-scale, site-specific dance work in the summer of 2023, Luisa’s creative juices began flowing again, and she essentially asked Jadyn out on what I call a “choreographic date.” Hoping to explore their mixed race experiences through their choreography, Jadyn quickly and easily obliged. It simply made sense to them. They, too, wondered about how dance might help them explore this facet of their identity. Luisa and Jadyn had already built a trusting, honest, and vulnerable friendship with one another, and so began their journey into creating Halo-Halo: Mixed-Mixed. 

Cut to February of 2025 at the Atlas Intersections Festival, the Atlas Performing Arts Center’s (Atlas PAC) annual performing arts festival that conveys how the arts and real world intersect. After presenting their work at earlier stages in three smaller settings, Jadyn and Luisa presented an evening-length version of their collaboration in Atlas PAC’s Lab Theater I. I walked into the intimate black box space, greeted by familiar faces, to find boxes neatly arranged throughout the performance space. Some of them were labeled: “Two or more races,” “white girl,” “exotic,” and “Filipino.” One large box, front and center onstage, said, “???” Relatable content. 

“The research is in us,” Luisa shared, “We are researching ourselves.” 

With their naturally humorous natures, Jadyn and Luisa entered the performance space talking about some strange interaction Luisa had with someone who seemed not to believe that she was Filipino. Soon, they both noticed the audience with feigned shock, asking: “Did you know there would be people?” I appreciated their reluctant acceptance of the audience into their collective interior world. They acquiesced, and the pair began their own individual journeys to either fit themselves into–or completely avoid– the boxes. 

Luisa tried stepping into the “white girl” box. Because it was simply too small, it collapsed beneath her. Jadyn decided to fashion gloves and socks out of the smaller boxes they could fit their hands and feet into, and they traversed the space like an extraterrestrial creature in search of a place to land. When Jadyn and Luisa encountered the “exotic” box, they shivered and writhed in disgust, sticking out their tongues and scrunching their faces for dramatic effect. Of course, this was met with thunderous laughter from the audience. I know I giggled. They both tried to fit into the “???” box together, but of course, this could not contain them both. 

Ultimately, Jadyn and Luisa decided to destroy the boxes and cast them away to the stage’s perimeter. A rather literal, yet comical expression of their aim for this work, the opening scene was a clear, accessible pathway for me, as an audience member, to begin the quest alongside the dancers. In their floral print tops and casual, earth-toned bottoms, I saw two humans setting the stage for their own personal excavation of their identities. They work to challenge the ways in which they have been confined to others’ interpretations of who they are. 

Set to electronic, minimalist music, Jadyn and Luisa slice through the space with blade-like arms, making room for themselves. They perform a contemporary movement score peppered with deep bends at the hips and knees, spiraling shapes, and continuously changing levels. They moved in sync with one another, shifting from one end of the stage to another with a leap, a free-flowing but focused turn, a skip, or a careful collection of steps. Their movement pushed and pulled. They shifted between wide open gaps  between their bodies in the space before sharing their weight in partner work; they weaved between and around one another with care and patience. 

Their movement, a familiar style that I have seen in contemporary dance spaces, felt true to them. In conversation with me, Luisa and Jadyn shared that their lived experience served as a guidepost for their compositional process. They also drew from extensive conversations with one another, favorite books about mixed race experience, and reflections on their previous written work.“The research is in us,” Luisa shared, “We are researching ourselves.” 

Jadyn, who is also a quarter Chinese, added, “I think there’s probably a mixed race dance that exists, and it would seem like I’m pulling from the traditional dance of this [Filipino or Chinese] culture and that [American] culture and I’m mixing them. That’s not what we are doing because it wouldn’t be authentic to our experiences…I think I carry a lot of shame around being Filipino enough or Asian enough.” Early on in their friendship, and later in their creative partnership, Luisa and Jadyn wanted to break their individual silences surrounding their biracial identities. They have both only recently started to feel comfortable sharing this reality with a broader audience. 

“Are people going to think I’m trying to be a relatable white person?” Luisa posed this question in our pre-performance conversation, and it addressed my initial confusion when I learned about her Filipino heritage. Plain and simple, I just thought she was white. Unintentionally, I put her in a box. Luisa ponders this duality often: “Walking through the world and presenting as white, but then having family gatherings with my Filipino family–my mom literally has like 30 Filipino first-cousins–are people going to believe me if I talk about it? Do I believe myself if I talk about it?” 

After Jadyn and Luisa’s opening duet, Jadyn exited the stage, waving goodbye to Luisa. Under deep blue lighting, Luisa performed an emotionally charged, somewhat somber solo as if she was torn between two worlds. She opened a curtain at the back of the space to reveal a television that played a series of home videos: a series of weddings, a home on a warm and sunny day, and children playing in the house’s front lawn. Eventually, I saw a toddler-aged Luisa playing and talking with her family, her rosy cheeks and deep brown hair still the same. Onstage, Luisa pulled out a collection of family memorabilia: photos, a quilt, small trinkets, and a tulle-like outfit that she eventually donned called a Maria Clara. It is a traditional Philippine outfit, with strong Spanish roots, worn by women and girls for special occasions.

I hear the voice of Luisa’s lola, her grandmother, recounting her own journey to the United States from the Philippines. When she returned to the Philippines to see her father, he said, “So, you are now a foreigner in your own country.” Luisa swirls, skips, and twirls throughout the space. I wonder if she is dancing with a younger version of herself or her lola, offering the comfort that neither of them received as they confronted their own heritage at young ages. When Luisa returned to her small family altar, I noticed the tears streaming down her cheeks. Although a performance, this moment was still her own form of therapy.  

“Oh, this is my baggage,” Jadyn stated matter-of-factly upon re-entering the stage, with an actually-full suitcase in tow. 

“Do you need help unpacking that?” Luisa asked. 

“Nope! I’m good,” Jadyn responded. Shrugging, Luisa left Jadyn with their baggage. 

Leave it to Jadyn and Luisa to give the audience a cheeky glimpse of what’s to come.  

Although initially reluctant to open the suitcase, Jadyn opened it to reveal an array of clothing items. Under the warm, orange hue of overhead lighting, they removed items one by one, inspecting the pieces before choosing which ones to sport or discard. Jadyn pulled out a silk dress that they tied around their neck; it seemed to possess them. They wriggled and jerked free from the dress’ apparent grasp before moving onto another piece. They are increasingly disquieted by each piece they slip into, adding layers upon layers of uncomfortable clothing, before erupting into chaotic, uninhibited, rather forceful movement to free themselves. I can hear Jadyn’s hurried, labored breath as they strain to be free again. 

And then, the unexpected happens. After putting on a dress, a scarf, eyeliner, eye shadow, lipstick, and a wig, Mitski’s “Nobody” plays overhead. Jadyn commenced the most passionate–and only–lip-synced rendition of the song that I have ever seen. It had the works: hair flips, desperate grabs for the chest, floor work, twirls of the dress. They even went to the very top of the audience seating for a bit! By the end of the song, they were a bit delirious. I honestly still need to ask them about this chunk. It completely caught me off guard! As a fan myself, I know that Mitski is Japanese-American, so maybe that’s all there is to it! 

“We would not be in the place that we are in our lives–literally–without our community, and we like to acknowledge that openly.” 

After giving the drag performance of a lifetime, Jadyn was still left to face the mess of unpacked baggage on the stage. After wiping away the makeup, Jadyn gathered the garments with tenderness. The frantic attempts to shove it away failed, and they eventually decide to gather it, hold it, and treat it with care. I can certainly relate to the fear and aversion that comes with confronting the shadowy, more challenging parts of myself in order to heal. Luisa returned, aiding Jadyn in the stage-clearing process before wrapping them into an embrace. The final moments of Halo-Halo: Mixed-Mixed find Jadyn and Luisa sharing each others’ weight, counterbalancing, and continuously supporting each other through the work’s conclusion.

“There are a lot of moments that can come up when you feel like you don’t fit in anywhere,” Jadyn shares in the post-show talk-back. “The answer to that is finding community, and we first find community in each other.” Luisa added, “We would not be in the place that we are in our lives–literally–without our community, and we like to acknowledge that openly.” 

In addition to their creative partnership, I have seen either or both of them dancing in work with local artists, working dance events at Dance Place, teaching, and even protesting for the dance community. It is such an honor to say that I knew them both when they were in search of the work that they do with such diligence and beauty now. I struggle to conclude my narration of such a tender story; I have barely scratched the surface of their journey and all of the ways that their individual paths intersect. The sun will have to set on this installment for now, but I am sure the sunbeam will shine and the breeze will continue to blow together. That always makes for a beautiful day.

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