Conversations with Lavi

Today we’d like to introduce you to Lavi.

Hi Lavi, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I have been a dancer since before I could walk. I started taking classes at the age of 2 and fell deeply in love. My dance studio became my second home for the next 16 years and influenced who I am today in profound ways. My journey with dance has ebbed and flowed from traumatic to beautiful to traumatically beautiful. I have loved and lost through it, including the loss of myself as well as a return home to myself. It has been a complicated relationship—both the thing that makes me feel the most alive, and at times the thing that has pulled me the farthest away from myself.

I grew up with a technical background, including tap, ballet, jazz, hip hop, partnering, contemporary, and even branched out into styles like Bollywood and Irish. Wherever dance took me, I followed. But growing up in such a rigid, technical environment suppressed my ability to find healing in movement. Dance became something performative, something to perfect—not something to feel. The pressure to be precise, clean, and polished slowly disconnected me from my own body. Movement began to feel rigid, and perfectionism crushed my spirit.

After leaving my childhood dance studio to move on to bigger things, it felt like my passion grew further and further away from me. Knowing that pursuing a career as a professional ballerina wasn’t in the cards for me, dance no longer felt like it could be a priority in my life. The realms I found it in during adulthood were competitive and suffocating—everything I hate about dance culture.

Then I found burlesque—a world that was silly, provocative, empowering, and endlessly malleable. I sank into its rhythm and, for the first time in years, began to reveal my spirit again through dance, movement, and creativity—not to be watched, judged, or perfected, but simply to be felt. The rigid constructs that had been ingrained in me began to slowly fall away. It made me feel like an artist more than ever before. It was also a world that helped me claim my queer identity in ways I hadn’t before—something that always felt suppressed as a ballerina.

Now, as I reside in Colorado, I’ve taken a leap into the world of production and cabaret—producing and directing my own shows, and being able to showcase some of my dearest and most talented friends. I’ve been able to tap into many aspects of my creativity through production, including dance, choreography, costuming, set design, acting, theatre, graphic design—and the list goes on.

My partner, Josie Nixon, has been a huge contributor to my journey in production and co-founded our production company, Lavender Juice Productions, with me. She is my biggest support for my creative endeavors and helps push me to places I never knew I could go.

My latest project is A Clown Ballet Cabaret—a multidimensional production that highlights a bit of my own journey as an artist.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I don’t think the road is ever smooth for an artist. Art reveals emotions and intensity that might otherwise stay buried. It has uncovered parts of me I never knew existed and forced me to confront some really hard truths. But through it all, I’ve learned to love myself more deeply, more unconditionally, and to allow myself to feel all the messiness that makes us human.

One of the hardest parts of being an artist, I think, is claiming that word as part of your identity: Artist. And then redefining what that truly means for you—not letting it be measured by external success, but by the ways it shapes you, the ways it heals you, and how you choose to move through the world because of it.

My journey has had plenty of detours. There were times I walked away from dance entirely, especially when perfectionism and performance overshadowed joy. But my journey now has helped me reconnect with movement in a way that feels playful, freeing, and personal. Through that, and through stepping into the world of cabaret and production, I’ve been able to carve out a version of artistry that feels like home.

Being an artist is difficult now more than ever—and also more necessary than ever. Time and time again, I’ve had to put my art on the back burner because it isn’t always the thing that pays the bills. But I’m grateful to always find my way back to it. Somehow, it always finds its way back to me, too.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I’m a dancer, producer, creative director, and choreographer—but above all, I’m an artist obsessed with creating the kind of work that pushes boundaries. Creative direction is my newest passion, and it’s where I feel the most inspired—whether I’m building entire burlesque plays, crafting unconventional clown ballets, or dreaming up variety shows that live somewhere between classy and completely unhinged.

My partner, Josie Nixon, and I co-founded Lavender Juice Productions, a company built on the belief that art should be weird, wild, and absolutely uncompromising. What we’re creating doesn’t really exist anywhere else, at least not in Denver. We’re blending the precision of technical dance with the grit, s*x, humor, and chaos of burlesque, while also drawing deeply from the expressive worlds of theatre and clown work—turning it all into something fresh.

One of my proudest projects so far is A Clown Ballet Cabaret, which premiered at the Denver Fringe Festival. I am the creative director and co-choreographer, and we built something extraordinary—funny, vulnerable, absurd, and deeply human. After receiving some amazing feedback, we’re now working to expand it into a full-length production with a recurring ensemble which is something entirely new to me.

Living in New Orleans had a huge impact on my creatively. It showed the parts of me waiting to be uncovered, more layers I hadn’t yet explored. Being surrounded by artists who were making things just for the sake of expression, community, and chaos—it woke something up in me. That city taught me the value of creating without needing it to be polished or agreeable. It gave me permission to make work that’s raw, real, and honest. That’s what I want to offer through my art—a space where not only me, but other people can show up as their wildest, truest selves.

The dance world is often too stiff, and the burlesque world can get stuck in its own tropes, often feeling a bit jaded, especially in Denver. I’m not interested in either box. I’m here to bring them together and build something entirely different—something with room to grow, to feel, to play. And I’m most proud of the fact that I get to do it with the people who inspire me the most.

Alright, so to wrap up, is there anything else you’d like to share with us?
If I could give my younger self any advice, it would be this: don’t let the world put you in a box—especially when it comes to your artistry. There are endless ways to express yourself as an artist, and you never have to confine yourself to just one.

The biggest lesson I’ve learned in claiming the identity of ‘artist’ is that inspiration lives everywhere. In the way you move through the world. In the people you meet. In the emotions you allow yourself to feel. In the trauma you’ve survived and the healing you’ve embraced. In the natural world, in how you spend your time, what you feed yourself, the clothes you wear, and the ways you choose to show up and be seen.

The more authentically you express yourself, the more aligned opportunities and community will find their way to you—like a warm, silly hug from the universe.

So don’t let anyone define what kind of artist you are—unless they’re lifting you up in the process.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lavender_juice_productions/?hl=en

Image Credits
Grant Syllaba
Irina Sarnetskaya
Alexis Aleana