The modern dance company Whim W'him opens the 2026-27 season this weekend with new works by three female choreographers. The company will perform on Sept. 11, 12, 17, 18 and 19 at 8 pm, and Sept. 13 at 2 pm at the Erickson Theater on Capitol Hill. They will also perform on Sept. 16 at 7:30 pm at the Vashon Arts Center.

Jessi Stegall, Kayla Farrish and Annie Rigney will feature new choreography for Whim W'him's Fall program. The company described the program in a statement:

'The program dives into a world that is mystical yet familiar with Jessi Stegall’s beautifully emphatic “Good Measure.” We then step into “Almost,” by Kayla Farrish, a dystopian inner landscape where we invite you on a journey of self-confronting; facing the fears, desires, and hidden parts of ourselves that we often choose to leave unseen. In Annie Rigney’s “We must believe it’s true,” we find ourselves bordering an insanity reflective of our current world state. We are left with a sense of hope and overwhelming urgency for tenderness. These three pieces are distinct and vital questionings of ourselves and how we interact with the systems we live within.'

According to her website "... Stegall (she/her) is a choreographer based in Chicago, IL. She has been a choreographer-in-residence with Point Park School of Dance, DanceWorks Chicago, Visceral Dance Chicago, Boston Center for the Arts, the National Center for Choreography (Akron), New Dance Partners (Kansas City) Hot Crowd Dance Company, Little Fire Artist Collective, Fever Dream Dance Collective, Harvard ArtLab, National Parks Service, and was featured as one of Dance Magazine’s “25 to Watch” (2022).

Farrish says, "I am and always have been a maker. Captivated by the whim, magic, and melancholy of the human experience, I aim to hold up a mirror to the society we form and participate in, to the communities and cultures we identify ourselves with, and lastly to the tremendous and unique experiences that form us as individuals. Our guts, instincts, weakness, power, voice that we do or don’t find, and our numerous attempts to relate, drive me—I believe in the physicality of what makes us inevitably, catastrophically, heartbreakingly, and wonderfully human."

Rigney is a New York-based dancer, choreographer, educator and Ilan Lev Method therapist. She is a 2025 Harkness Promise Awardee and NYFA/NYSCA Artist Fellow and 2024 Bessie Award nominee. Rigney has been commissioned by the Martha Graham Dance Company, Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company, Composers Now, and Resilience Dance Company and performed at venues including the Joyce Theater, 92NY, and Mexico City’s Teatro de la Ciudad. Her piece for the Graham Company, “Get Up, My Daughter”, was nominated for a 2024 Bessie Award. Her evening length work, “...she was becoming untethered.” premiered at 92NY during her time as the 2023-24 Artist in Residence.

More information and tickets are available on the Whim W'him website.