About

Kharyshi Wiginton is an interdisciplinary artist with a BA in theatre arts/dance from CSUSB and an MFA in Creative Inquiry from CIIS. Kharyshi incorporates live music, choreography, and directing into art and has contributed her talents to productions of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, For Colored Girls, Pippin, and Godspell. 

She was Artistic Director for Equal Opportunity Productions, and in 2003 she accompanied 12 youth and 7 mentors to South Africa for an international cultural exchange project. While there, she was the Artistic Director for Soze II, a youth show that was created and toured throughout the Johannesburg area. In 2005, she went back to South Africa as a member of the group Colors of the Diaspora. As a member of that group, she participated in an international cultural exchange project for adults and presented a show at the 2005 National Arts Festival in South Africa.  

In 2006, Ms. Wiginton stepped into what is possibly the most important transition of her lifetime. She moved to Oakland, California, where she made the following pivotal decisions: to begin graduate school, to become a member of the Bay Area dance community, and to start her dance company. In 2008, after taking part in the 2007 Black Choreographer’s Festival’s choreography workshop, the 2008 Black Choreographer’s Festival’s Next Wave Choreographer’s Showcase, and the 2007 and 2008 spring dance productions at Laney College where she presented several dance and spoken word pieces, Kharyshi established her dance company, P.R.I.S.M. Dance Company, and launched the company’s premier dance concert. 

Kharyshi is a powerful force indeed! In 2012, she was part of the Black Choreographer’s Festival AMP program and produced a 15-minute dance piece, and she performed her solo show, “Too Much Woman 4 This World,” in the 2018's Vavasati International Women's Festival and performed at the State Theater. In 2020 she created & curated the 1st international digital art festival for the Black Arts Movement Business District (BAMBD) Festival. Additionally, she is a poet/writer, dancer/choreographer, actor/director, performer, curator, and now she is a podcaster. In fall 2018, she created her first podcast “Sexy Side of Size,” and in fall 2020 she created her second podcast “Too Much Woman 4 This World.”

Among her list of accomplishments, Kharyshi’s resilience is perhaps her greatest. For she has continued when the world said stop and fought when the battle seemed impossible. She is a firecracker, a powerful artist with intense goals, and her personal identity and life experiences continue to fuel her creative process.  More than anything, her art seeks to effect change. It tells stories of those rarely mentioned, empowers the broken-spirited, gives voice to those who cannot speak, and tackles difficult issues such as self-esteem, body image, and sizism.

Additional Information

Willing to be contacted for: Writing, performance, artistic development, coaching, etc.