CAUTERY depicts the visceral urge to remove, burn off, or destroy undesired parts of oneself. The dancers in this pas de deux represent parts of a whole and the human struggle to be free of that which causes pain. 

Choreography: Alexa Capareda

Dancers: Alyssa Manguiat, Arnaldo Hernandez

Lighting Designer/Technical Director: Steven Myers

photo by Sarah Annie Navarrete

Alexa Capareda is a sugar-powered dancemaking noodle robot who engages in virtuosity, versatility, and the earnest and playful. She trained in her native Philippines, Austin, and Montreal before joining Balet Bratislava in Slovakia. Her choreography has been commissioned by SALT Dance, Ballet Austin, tbd. dance collective, Houston Contemporary, Columbia Repertory Ballet, and ZACH Theatre. She has presented work at Big Medium, Austin Dance Festival, Barnstorm Dance Festival, and Fusebox Festival. She is Rehearsal Director of Ballet Austin TWO, Assistant Director with Performa/Dance, and has made work with BLiPSWiTCH, Frank Wo/Men, Salvage Vanguard Theater, ARCOS, Magdalena Jarkowiec, Jennifer Sherburn, Austin Camerata, and LOLA Austin. She has collaborated with sound artists Steve Parker, Brent Baldwin, VAMP, and Henna Chou, and visual artists Essentials Creative, Tom Suhler, and Susan Scafati. She was a prizewinner at the 2013 Festival of Choreographic Miniatures in Serbia and recipient of the 2017 Austin Critics Table Award for Excellence as Dancer. She has a BA English, minor in Theater and Dance from UT-Austin. 

Alyssa Manguiat, originally from Mason, Ohio, received her training from the Cincinnati Ballet Academy and later joined Cincinnati Ballet's trainee program, second company, and eventually their main company. In her time there, she danced in works by George Balanchine, Victoria Morgan, Adam Hougland, Septime Webre, and Kirk Peterson, among many others. In 2021, she joined Ballet Austin as a company dancer and has had the pleasure of performing works by Stephen Mills, Amy Seiwert, Jennifer Archibald, George Balanchine, and Jessica Lang. She has especially enjoyed performing roles such as the Waltz Girl in Balanchine’s Serenade, Adam & Eve Pas de Deux in Mills’ Light/The Holocaust and Humanity Project, and the corps de ballet in Seiwert’s Traveling Alone and Renaissance. In 2022, Ms. Manguiat danced with the Contemporary Ballet Ensemble at Jacob’s Pillow, where she worked with Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, Jennifer Archibald, and Nina Ananiashvili, among many other dance icons. Manguiat has also taught ballet at Cincinnati Ballet summer intensives and has her very own hand-made dancewear business called MangoMade!

Arnaldo Hernandez is from Bayamon, Puerto Rico, where he began training at Pasos Ballet Academy and The Conservatory of Ballet Concierto of Puerto Rico. He was later accepted to The Rock School for Dance Education where he performed in Nutcracker 1776 as well as Gala and Fringe Festival showcases. He later joined Pennsylvania Ballet’s second company and danced the pas de trois from Paquita, Celtic Fire and the pas de deux from La Fille Mal Gardée. He also appeared in company productions such as George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker, Macmillan’s Romeo & Juliet, Angel Corella’s La Bayadere and Jerome Robbins’ Glass Pieces.