We recently connected with Shawnette Heard and have shared our conversation below.

Shawnette , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

One of the most meaningful projects I’ve worked on to date would have to be my passion foundation, Captiv8docu. This is a project that is built and shaped from my own story. I was approached to share my dance journey — the highs, the lows, and the in-betweens. I stepped away to think about it, and the universe guided me to turn my story into a foundation.

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 found my dream to become a professional dancer when I was around 11 years old. My mom wanted to keep me busy and interested in something to keep me out of trouble. I grew up in the inner city with a single mom. She wanted to make sure that I was not idle — she always said, “an idle mind is a welcome mat for trouble.” My mom decided to enroll me into an arts program. From there, I met my first dance teacher, Ruth Ashton Blake, who gave us free dance classes. It was from those classes that I realized my dream of becoming a professional dancer. After that, I went to CalArts for one year after high school. I realized I wanted to go straight to Hollywood. I auditioned for a scholarship with Edge Performing Arts Center and trained with some incredible educators. I then auditioned for a dance agent, and my career went up from there. My first big job was booking the ‘Janet Tour’ with Janet Jackson and Tina Landon at the helm of choreography. I worked for Janet for 3 tours, and through that experience I learned so much about the industry and life. My final tour with Janet was the ‘All 4 You’ tour, which I co-directed with Janet and was one of the main choreographers. From that experience, I learned that I wanted to be in film/production. I made the decision to step away from dance and take a personal life journey, as well as go to film school. Stepping away from dance and such a successful career was very scary. Working with icons like Madonna, Beyonce, Michael & Janet Jackson, to name a few, my dance career far exceeded my expectations. I enrolled in New York Film Academy, and shot my first film, ‘John Doe.’ This film won several awards, including ‘Audience Choice’ & ‘Best Film Shot in Los Angeles.’ That was one of my many proudest moments. From there I shot 3 more films. My latest film ‘Monster Spray.’ is doing pretty well in the short film circuit as we speak. I partnered with executive producer Melissa Ciampa and writer Lucia Tarantino for these films. It has been an incredible union of women in film. Today I am the creative director of Spittn Image, a commercial production company, and I still teach workshops with the new generation of dancers. My latest venture is my dance foundation Captiv8docu. Little did I know that dance would bring me here and beyond. I am looking forward to what else is in store.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

Building my dance foundation Captiv8docu has been a big test of resilience and steadfastness. Once I knew this was something that I was going to do, I met with a team of lawyers & business executives to learn how to move forward. This world was very foreign to me. Learning how to register, copyright, and reach out for funding for Captiv8docu was a big learning curve. My goal for the program/foundation is to last for years to come and to change the lives of our LGBTQIA+ dancers and talent. Even creating the logo, I was turned down by several designers because it was a project for the Queer community. Reaching out to sponsors and donors & getting “no’s” based on the content of the project was very hurtful. But as I have learned throughout my career, there is NO PLAN B and this is going to happen. Knocking on the right doors, I am happy to say we have partnered with housing shelters, as well as received financing for the launch of Captiv8docu’s first season. With something so dear to my heart, the rejection was very painful. But I have prevailed, and the hard work is not over. Being that Captiv8docu is built from my own personal dance journey, I wanted to reveal all parts of me and get vulnerable. I definitely had to practice resilience, and not take the homophobia personal. We still have a long road, unfortunately.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

The most rewarding aspect of being a creative is that the journey is unlimited. Whether you want to be a designer, engineer, or start a foundation, it is all possible. From the seed of my dreams to become a dancer, I realized so much about myself as an artist and person. I really learned I love to help people and elevate talent. I love seeing the creative through, whether I am the creator or someone else is. This is such a passion of mine. I didn’t know it would come through my own experience and story.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.spittnimage.com
• Instagram: @nulyphe02 & @captiv8docu

Image Credits

Personal photo headshot photographer – Rhapsody James