We were lucky to catch up with Emily Hart Lopez recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Emily , thanks for joining us today. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

I always wanted to be an artist from probably age 6 onwards, but started to truly visualize it by age 12 or 13 when I joined my local musical theater company in 8th grade. My parents have always told me that even as a toddler or young girl, they could play just about any genre of music and I would naturally dance well to it. They are loving, supportive parents, so who knows whether or not their observation was true or not, but I like to believe it is.

I found dance when I was on a playdate at age 3 with a friend back in Texas, and her mom forgot she had ballet class, so I ended up joining them. I watched and told my mom “I have to do that!”, so the studio owner, Mrs. Pelosi, let me in to start enrolling in classes even though they didn’t normally take students that age yet. I was hungry to dance, and the rest was history.

Around age 4, almost 5, I was diagnosed with Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia and wound up being in treatment for 2 years. During that time, I took a pause from dance, but by age 8 or so I made my way back to dancing and performance. The arts have been the greatest source of light, peace, joy, and part of my life mission, for as long as I can remember.

When I was sick, entertainment was my source of distraction: old timely musicals, “I Love Lucy”, comedy films like “The God’s Must Be Crazy” (during blood transfusions), and so much more, were my saving graces. Getting to do anything creative and to even meet artists thanks to Make-A-Wish Foundation, Kidd’s Kids, and others, were one of the greatest sources of joy for me outside of the love of my family and the provision of the divine.

When I was in treatment, the craziest miraculous things would happen to me: like getting to be in a commercial for Make-A-Wish, being interviewed in a paper, being in a documentary, singing at a gala ball, walking down a charity fashion show, and so much more. Looking back at it now, I think having artists all around me, giving me a space to feel confident and special, were all placed in my life path to carve out what would one day become my career and a way of life.

Thankfully, once I entered remission, I have never looked back. I remember losing my hair from chemo, being taken on walks in a kid wagon cause I was too weak to walk, even using a walker. And now, to know my life’s calling is to use my body, mind, voice, and spirit to bring others some sense of joy, community, and safety feels like a full circle moment.

When these really exciting opportunities started to present themselves during my treatment, I was interviewed back then saying I wanted to be a “famous fashion designer, singer, and prima ballerina”, so I guess I was dreaming of the arts and being a little diva from an early age. I also saw the 1990s movie version of “Annie” and dreamed of NYC.

Fast forward to 8th grade, doing musical theater, my vision was to move to NYC and pursue a career as a performer. I went on to attend arts high school (Charleston County School of the Arts) and an arts conservatory for college (The University of North Carolina School of the Arts).

By 2016, one month after graduation, I moved to NYC with no job and booked my first NYC professional job in 2 weeks. Within 1-2 months of living here, I even auditioned as an adult swing (short girl perks) for a production of “Annie”, singing in front of the original lyricist for “Annie”. My nerves got the best of me, and I certainly didn’t book that job as rejection is the name of the game, but that was a full circle experience for sure. I’ve been living here and working here ever since.

Since dreaming about this path from an early age, I am proud of myself for fulfilling some of those goals and dreams, but the road has been much harder and much more unexpected than that little girl would have imagined.

Between a global pandemic, the economy, a mountain of an industry that is the arts and entertainment business, the road to stay in the creative/artistic path has been full of obstacles and unknowns. I wouldn’t trade my experience for anything, however, and I have confidence that I’m a “for lifer” when it comes to a life in the arts. I also acknowledge the extreme privilege I have to pursue this path in the first place in NYC and having had access to arts education most of my life. I will never take this for granted.

I can tell you, my passion for art and storytelling, studying human behavior and the human condition, will never be a fire extinguished, but there are times the fire dims. It’s easy to lose sight of the why, even though the want never has died for me.

I don’t know what lies ahead for me in this path, but this stubborn lady, who doesn’t take having a moving and relatively healthy body for granted, is still here, sticking it out, trying to find my way.

I give her grace, I thank my family and teachers, systems of support, friends, peers, employers, and beyond, for making a way for me to be pursuing my path in the creative life. I believe it takes a village to make anyone thrive, and I have my loved ones–and anyone who gave me an open door–to thank for that.

Right now, I am working on opening that door to better support myself and my peers more fairly in our creative lives and I have a long road ahead, but I’ll never forget when I first knew that I wanted this, because I always knew. That will never change no matter what the outcome.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I got into dance first and foremost, because it is the skill I have dedicated myself to more than anything outside of maybe brushing my teeth or drinking water daily, lol. Dance is what I know, and I’ve spent the last 26 years of my life, having dance a part of my lifestyle. Outside of studio dance growing up, community musical theater, majoring in dance in high school and college, I grew up playing piano, some guitar, singing, acting, and just overall was always surrounded by art. My relatives were exceptional visual artists, I was exposed to visual arts classes (even though some teachers did not approach arts education the way I think they should), but it’s all to say, art was always around me.

I grew up in small towns, and most of my life on an island by the water, very isolated from many things. Therefore, I had time to use my imagination, listen to stories, write poetry, be in nature, and explore my creativity. My parents were creative themselves (although never pursued careers in the arts), but they always encouraged me and my brother to explore our creative affinities. I will always thank them for that.

This all being said, the arts were always a part of my life and where I always imagined my life going.

Now, I have expanded my field to go beyond dance performance, but into some work in theater, on screen, in dance education, and also in producing events. My life consists of teaching adults dance (young and old) several times a week to performing for companies or gigs, booking my own gigs, and getting talent booked for gigs. This kind of work can range anywhere from music videos (I sometimes choreograph for artists or small companies or productions), or I can be found performing latin or bollywood styles, or doing very random and creative projects.

I never limit my craft to one genre or medium or style. I consider myself to be a dance chameleon, and that is one of the few badges I wear with honor and pride, despite several other feelings of imposter syndrome. For instance, I have worked professionally as an actor in theater (in person and online), but have never been formally trained. I had to learn how to perform Shakespeare quickly, have found myself studying and training in the craft of acting when I can alongside my dance career, and I just keep trying to expand my experiences.

The types of products/services/creative works I provide are pretty broad based off of 7 plus years freelancing in a crazy city, but I do specialize in these skills specifically:

Dance Performance: latin (solo & partnering), latin fusion, social dance, contemporary, heels, freestyle, and bollywood.

Acting: immersive theater, character acting, improv, commercial, film/t.v.

Teaching: latin (solo & partnering) such as salsa on 1 & 2, bachata, cha cha. Also, feminine movement, heels, dance technique/alignment, contemporary, wedding dance choreography, and basics of other styles (depending on the request).

Producing: I work with clients (mainly corporate) to get talent (mostly dancers and actors) booked for events to perform, model, and more. I manage casting, contracts, and logistics between talent and the client with my new side business: HartHeals Productions ( @hartheals on IG) .

I feel the problems I am really good at solving for others are the following. I’m especially strong at working with beginner dancers. I love helping people build confidence and find joy through movement.

I also have a deep passion for changing my industry, so I often go above and beyond to get my networks and myself cast for gigs where we can be compensated fairly, and well treated for our time and effort. The biggest problems I see in my field are artists being so hungry to work, doing whatever it takes to get work, putting in so much time, money, and effort for their craft and to get a job in the first place, yet not being treated fairly and often being overlooked.

My mission is to set a new standard and a new bar for professional performers to get well paid in good working conditions by clients who need their talent. No one is mentoring me in this, and I am learning as I go, but I feel the results have spoken well so far. My work has ranged form european hair companies to NY PR, IKEA USA, international clients, flashmobs, birthday parties, arts festivals, performance art, motivational dancing, and more.

Being able to get talent and myself work without agents, managers, or auditions, is the work I am most proud of: being a proactive go-getter, who doesn’t wait for opportunity to come knocking, but who creates and pursues opportunity for me and my networks “when the going gets tough”.

I want my clients to know that I deliver work with extreme integrity, exceptional and thorough communication, transparency, professionalism, talent, kindness, and skill. My networks will vouch for me in this.

I am consistent in how I do business and how I show up in spaces. I will lead with good character, and I will acknowledge my mistakes, improve, do better, learn as I go, and take chances.

If I had to sum up who I am as a person and an artist, core values of my brand would be the following:

1) Heart
2) Integrity
3) Dedication

I don’t give up on my resiliency and I believe in bringing art to others, and taking good care of my fellow industry professionals. I want to elevate what it means to be an arts worker in modern times, without having to be famous to be treated with the same working standards as any other profession. I want artists to be able to work full time without struggling, and to be valued members of society without having to have a wide reach to the masses in order to achieve the stability they deserve. It feels like an impossible mountain to climb, but I believe small chipping away at this goal will make improvements nonetheless. I stand in solidarity with my fellow arts workers.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

I want to answer this question, not only because it is a great one, but because it is so relevant and so necessary.

The majority of working artists I know (I know so many talented, capable, and experienced artists) are not getting the support they deserve. All in all, we already know life isn’t fair, it has its challenges for everyone, but we see that unless you are part of a large network film or television production, or working for a big musical artist, or becoming a household name, the majority of arts workers are still having to have “survival jobs” or “the side hustle”.

In other industries, we don’t see as many people having to work several jobs at one time. For artists like myself, most of us have jobs with no benefits, to health insurance, not even hourly pay sometimes. Much of freelancer, independent contractor work is stipend based, not even all work is under a contract, there are not set rates for certain types of work (Dancer’s Alliance is working on this, but I mostly see this for those doing commercial jobs with agents and/or managers involved).

As creatives, we often go into our field with only education in how to do the skill itself. Our arts education rarely provides us with education in business education or anything practical that comes with navigating your own entity as an independent business. I would argue that formal arts education (where many of us rack up student loans that are impossible to pay with our professional working rates/cost of living), actually fails us most of the time.

While “who you know” or your “alumni network” can help bring in work for you as an artist, very few education systems in the arts give us the tools to understand the practical realities of being a freelancer, especially in a big city. For instance, freelancers have to stay super on top of their schedule, make their own contracts, and even sometimes hound people down to pay them on time or even at all, often living paycheck to paycheck.

This all being said, I would say that society can do a better job by the following:

1) Things like this article: ask more arts workers about their life and experience who are not celebrities or big names in the industry. Report about their lives, gather information and statistics, and share it widely, loudly, and across many public platforms.

2) Stop trying to cut arts funding. In so many education systems, we see STEAM is never as valued as STEM and that arts programs are often the first to get cut out of the budget. This mentality trickles down from the government to schools to local programs. These are jobs lost, opportunities lost for youth and new generations to develop critical thinking skills, build empathy, compassion, resiliency, discipline, muscle memory, collaboration, listening skills, personal agency, and so much more.

3) Ask artists you meet questions, rather than make statements at them. Ex. You’re a dancer…like on Broadway or DWTS? Assuming a dancer is synonymous with a stripper or a low income worker who can’t make any money at all from their craft. If an artist says they are a professional in their craft, then they do make money from it. Not all arts workers struggle in the same way financially as others, and some are full time without having “side hustles”. Not all artists are “starving artists”. Having a career in the arts is “a real job”. The point here, is just as many artists might not make broad statements to someone working in a field totally unrelated to them, what makes others outside of it entitled to believe the assumptions they hear about artists? And make statements before asking artists about their lives? Having a sense of curiosity first will go a long way, rather than assumptions. There are so many roles in the arts, and they are quite interesting and worth discovering. Many people might learn how essential the arts really are if they just asked more questions.

One of my favorite quotes on this subject:

“Medicine, law, business, engineering, these are all noble pursuits, and
necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.”
― Dead Poet’s Society

Have you ever had to pivot?

I will actually share my current story. I am currently having to look into finding new and more sustainable sources of income for myself beyond my several teaching jobs, my side hustle job, my gig based work, and auditions or submissions. This transition is largely due to the fact that I live alone with increased rent in the now number 1 most expensive city in the U.S during a time where everything is going up in cost. Unfortunately, despite having more experience now and advocating for myself where I can, I have come to the realization that the freelancer path is not as sustainable during these times post global pandemic in NYC as it was when I came here.

Unfortunately, I am not seeing breakdowns for castings or even job postings or gig pay to be increasing even though everything else is increasing. I am still seeing and even being asked to work for free, which I find to be extremely problematic in 2023. It is disheartening to see other artists ask other artists to dance for free or even pay to dance or perform (yes this still happens and you can see it on Backstage, NYC Dancers group on Facebook, and other places). It is understandable to work for free if it is for charity, but the fact that “pay to play” and “free labor” is still perpetuated in the arts community in the U.S and in some of the top cities for arts workers is quite distressing.

I currently have ideas, plans, and goals I am working towards to better understand what temporary pivot I need to make in order to better sustain myself in my field. As we have seen with the recent SAG-AFTRA and WAG strikes, so many people in the arts and entertainment lost work and their work is being threatened, and needs protection against big dog corporations still trying to take advantage of artists.

This is a never-ending story and saga that I hope does change, and hopefully it is starting to, but we have a long way to go.

While I am not giving up, nor plan to remove myself from the arts completely, I am currently grappling with trying to understand what other work I will need to take on adjacent to my career as an artist so that I don’t have to continue to live gig to gig, contract to contract, or rely on so many unknowns and question marks.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.emilyhartlopez.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emilyhartlopez/?hl=en
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/emilyhartlopez/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emily-hart-lopez-08718b295/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxuexubVk58PCol6scPhLSg
• Other: https://www.gigsalad.com/emily_hart_lopez_freelance_danceractor_new https://app.castingnetworks.com/talent/public-profile/23be87f8-6348-11eb-8f1b-0291f623b406

Image Credits
Darryl Justin Padilla (yellow top photo & black & white photos) Mike Esperanza (Full blue outfit and denim outfit photos) Ryan Vava (phone with blue fringe outfit) Photographer Courtesty of Flint Reperatory Theater (rose & snake theater images)