Gisella-Guadalupe Páez

Gisella-Guadalupe Páez is a multidisciplinary artist anchored in Interplay between The Body, The Practice, and The Artistic Outcome.

“Her performances are physically rigorous, creatively engaging, and critically informed.”

Gisella’s Vision is to bridge the gap between the studio, classroom, gallery, and performance.

Her work begins with the premise that creative inquiry is transition. Much like “the Law of Conservation of Mass: in a closed system, matter is not created or destroyed; it only changes form.” investigating how movement, when stripped of aesthetics, allows the body to generate artifacts like paintings, drawings, and choreographic extensions that can serve as living documentation of the artistic process.

Gisella’s mission aims to democratize the art making process by moving away from traditional, isolated technical training, favoring instead an "intelligent engine" approach.

Gisella values investment in the collaborator, Enhancing the mechanics of sensation, researching distribution of weight, and the capacity for the full body to support a wide range of artistic endeavors, from performance to PEDAGOGY.

“My work explores the transfer of physical sensation from exercise  into tangible artistic output.”

Since joining the Boston Dance Theater (BDT) trainee program in September 2025 under the co-artistic direction of Jessie Jeanne Stinnett and Itzik Galili, she trains daily with the main company, understudies their repertoire, and explores the company's use of choreographic and improvisational methodologies, performance pedagogies, and critical dance processes involving history and theory. As part of the trainee cohort she has performed in new works by Daniel Navarro Lorenzo, Chloe Crenshaw, Betty Garcia, and Henoch Spinola.

Prior to BDT, Gisella worked as a freelance artist, her professional experience includes collaborative projects with Boris Charmatz at The Barnes Foundation and Susannah Yugler at The University of Pennsylvania. Beyond Performance, Gisella has a background in fitness instruction. Having taught various exercise modalities in studio settings, she has developed a foundation in strength-based training and form focused instruction. 

She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) from The University of the Arts (Uarts), School of Dance, under the direction of Donna Faye Burchfield where her formal education included daily training in ballet, contemporary forms, traditional modern techniques, exercise modalities, and somatic approaches. During her studies she performed repertoire by Doug Varone and Merce Cunningham, and premiered original works by Jenn Nugent, Mark Caserta, Emily Wexler, Jung-eun Kim, Jesse Zaritt, Sidra Bell, Katie Swords Thurman, and Tommie Waheed Evans.

she has pursued intensive studies with the American Dance Festival (ADF), Hubbard Street, Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company (KCDC), GagaLabs, and Sidra Bell Dance New York.

Gisella continues to develop her own choreography, specifically her full-length work, “The Nights Before the Mourning After,” which premiered in May 2022.

Gisella is currently based in Cambridge, MA, and plans to relocate to NYC in August 2026 following her completion of the trainee program with Boston Dance Theater.