About the author
Sam Kerson grew up in the Northeast US, born in 1946 in North Adams Mass, a place where Spanish is never spoken. During his years in the Navy he was in Key West for a few months , Guantanamo for a few days as well as in Barcelona . That is where he started to hear Spanish speakers and began to get an idea about, The Americas.
In 1970, totally by chance he was invited to accompany the daughter of an American professor who owned a house in San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico. They stayed there on the edge of the city for six months. This was the beginning of decades of visits and experiences in Latin America.
In Cuzco he met the great Argentine director Norman Briski who was just beginning a thirteen-year exile. He studied with Briski from that first meeting and works with him to this day. He encountered and was inspired by the mural movement in Mexico. At the time, there were many Mexican muralists working in Nicaragua such as Arnold Belkin. As the director of Dragon Dance Theatre he presented work at the International Theatre Festival in Havana, as well as at the Calle de los Titeres in Buenos Aires.
From '87 till '92, he worked as a Brigadista in Nicaragua every year getting involved in different cultural projects; theatre projects and a mural project mostly in collaboration with Arts for a New Nicaragua, and the Culture Center in Masaya.
Since '76 he has been the artistic director of Dragon Dance Theatre. Most of the work consists of; developing collective creations, on site, from traditional stories, with local actors. In the last 20 years, much of this work has been done with indigenous communities in Mexico.
Sam Kerson grew up in the Northeast US, born in 1946 in North Adams Mass, a place where Spanish is never spoken. During his years in the Navy he was in Key West for a few months , Guantanamo for a few days as well as in Barcelona . That is where he started to hear Spanish speakers and began to get an idea about, The Americas.
In 1970, totally by chance he was invited to accompany the daughter of an American professor who owned a house in San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico. They stayed there on the edge of the city for six months. This was the beginning of decades of visits and experiences in Latin America.
In Cuzco he met the great Argentine director Norman Briski who was just beginning a thirteen-year exile. He studied with Briski from that first meeting and works with him to this day. He encountered and was inspired by the mural movement in Mexico. At the time, there were many Mexican muralists working in Nicaragua such as Arnold Belkin. As the director of Dragon Dance Theatre he presented work at the International Theatre Festival in Havana, as well as at the Calle de los Titeres in Buenos Aires.
From '87 till '92, he worked as a Brigadista in Nicaragua every year getting involved in different cultural projects; theatre projects and a mural project mostly in collaboration with Arts for a New Nicaragua, and the Culture Center in Masaya.
Since '76 he has been the artistic director of Dragon Dance Theatre. Most of the work consists of; developing collective creations, on site, from traditional stories, with local actors. In the last 20 years, much of this work has been done with indigenous communities in Mexico.