Dance
Styx Dance Company Blends Technique, Grit and Miami Style
Dancers of Styx The Company, founded by Brianna Campbell and Mika Santo, presents “1st: A Technicolor Mind Museum ” Saturday, May 17 at the Aventura Arts & Cultural Center (Photo courtesy of Mika Santo)
For those raised on ballet, with its centuries of tradition, dance often means elegance, precision, and refinement. But in Miami, a city where creative categories often blend, dance thrives as much on street battles as on barre. Dance forms like breaking, waacking, and voguing have stepped beyond subculture and onto the main stage. To some purists, this shift raises eyebrows and questions: “Is that really dance? Is it even art?”
Brianna Campbell, co-founder and co-artistic director of Styx the Company has heard it all before. But for her, dance begins with one principle: movement is movement. And all movement tells a story. Styx’s last program, “Not a Ballet,” challenged that bias — the idea that ballet or modern are “real” dances while everything else might look flashy on Instagram but lacks substance. For Campbell, that’s exactly the kind of assumption worth choreographing against.
From left, Joaquín Espinosa, Abigail Mas and Rachel Abelenda, dancers of Styx The Company. (Photo courtesy of Mika Santo)
Co-founded in 2022 by dancers Campbell and Mika Santo, Styx emerged just as Miami’s arts scene was surfacing from the long shadow of the COVID lockdown — a time when even the most established organizations were struggling to stay afloat. A transplant from North Carolina, Campbell saw in Miami what many overlook: a city rich in dance talent, where artists train across styles — from classical to contemporary, from concert stages to commercial shoots.
“There’s a variety of training here,” says Campbell. “Dancers can do concert work, modern and contemporary, or go into commercial styles like jazz, funk, and hip hop. And some (performers) are still strictly ballet.”
Santo says that the range of styles Miami dancers exhibited was a plus.
“Being in Miami, we couldn’t ignore the obvious strength in commercial dance,” says Santo. “A lot of opportunities for jobs are in commercial dance styles like hip hop and funk. Our dancers are not just trained in concert forms. Many of us are trained in commercial style, and we don’t want to stick our commercial training in the background. You can do commercial work and concert work. I mean, dance is dance,” says Santo.
Styx The Company dancer Rachel Abelenda. (Photo courtesy of Mika Santo)
Their next show – “1st: A Technicolor Mind Museum ” – opens Saturday, May 17 at the Aventura Arts & Cultural Center and showcases the commercial training of the company’s dancers. “All the music (for the show) is super upbeat and funky – think RuPaul’s Drag Race but our edition of it,” says Campbell. For this show, Styx has also teamed up with BreakinMIA – a group of professional breakdancers based in Hialeah.
“We started the company by making videos for each other,” recalls Campbell. In May 2022, she and Santo collaborated on “Roses,” a video project that became their test run for launching the company. “(“Roses”) was one of the first projects where we were able to pay for everything. We paid the dancers, we paid for the space and we realized we could start a company on the basis of our success there,” explains Santo.
Santo is a Florida native and graduate of New World School of the Arts. Campbell, by contrast, grew up in Charleston, N.C., where — she’s quick to point out — arts patrons are both vocal and financially committed to their causes. In Miami, finding reliable support from private donors has been a tougher climb. The two submitted seven grant applications to fund their upcoming season, but without a dedicated administrative team, navigating the process has been a serious uphill task, they said.
“We put in so much work and effort,” says Campbell. “It is very hard to do all of it, but it was because no one has seen us in that light yet. There is so much involved both in creating art and in managing art.”
Despite the obstacles, Campbell and Santo have kept Styx not only intact but thriving, with dancers paid and the company moving into its fourth year. Along the way, Styx has become a launchpad — offering many South Florida dancers their first professional opportunity.
Styx The Company dancer Abigail Mas. (Photo courtesy of Mika Santo)
One of them is Abigail Mas, a graduate of Nova Southeastern University’s dance program. Mas first connected with “Styx” through classes with Santo and joined the company as an apprentice during its “Volume 1” season (2022–2023), stepping in when others were absent or injured. Now she’ll appear in eleven of the May program’s fifteen works as a full company member.
A dancer since she was 4 years old, Mas trained almost exclusively in ballet and modern before joining Styx in 2022. Since then, she’s expanded her range to include commercial styles like hip hop — part of the company’s hybrid ethos.
In the May program, Mas performs a contemporary duet with fellow dancer, Grace Andersen, choreographed by Campbell and set to Gwen Stefani’s 2006 hit, “Wind It Up.” Mas admits the piece pushes her limits — and not just choreographically. She’ll be dancing it in four-and-a-half-inch, hot pink heels.
When asked what has made Styx successful with audiences, Campbell pointed to one element above all: the music.
“It’s our music—I did a solo (in our last show) that was choreographed by Rachel Abelenda – it was in the styles of (José) Limón and (Martha) Graham, and I was doing it to “Money Trees” by Kendrick (Lamar) – we did ballet to pure hip hop music,” says Campbell. “We also took classical music from, “Don Quixote,” and we did everything but ballet to it. This shows we can break technique but still show it.”
Styx The Company dancer Joaquin Espinosa. (Photo courtesy of Mika Santo)
For Mas, the company’s success lies in its embrace of diversity. “I do think that what Styx has to offer is very diverse and different than the other dance shows that you will see in the area,” says Mas. “We have a high production quality, and I think the passion that we all have really stands out as well – there is a really strong community in Styx that really cares for each other, and it’s a beautiful thing to see.”
WHAT: “1st: A Technicolor Mind Museum” presented by Styx The Company
WHERE: Aventura Arts and Cultural Center, 3385 NE 188th Street, Aventura
WHEN: 3 and 8 p.m., Saturday, May 17
COST: $38-$47
INFORMATION: 305-466-8002 or www.aventuracenter.org/events
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