An established professional artist with over 15 years of experience in dance and movement, Ella trained at Laban/LSCD and also studied politics at Leeds university. Ella is of mixed heritage and was born in Canterbury, but grew up in Bristol. She has studied dance in Brazil (first visting in 2004), Cuba (first visiting in 2011), NYC (first visiting in 2009 with a Lisa Ullman scholarship) and the UK.

Performance highlights include Russell Maliphant Company, Lea Anderson (The Chomondeleys), Olympics Opening Ceremony. Ella was a Bench fellow and resident at Casa Latin American Festival (2015), Associate Artist at Dance City (2017), Associate Artist Trinity Centre Bristol (2018), Slate World Artist (2020), Pervasive Media Studio Resident (2020). Ella curated She Created Her Life Festival, and produced 5 Roots Of Rumba events: an international dance festival. A WCMT grant took her to Brazil and Cuba (2017) and AIDF awards (2018) took her to Capetown collaborating with South African poet Toni Stuart. Ella’ also runs Ella Mesma Company. Her most recent creation in lockdown ‘I am all womxn‘ has received over 7,700 views on facebook.

‘Maya Gandaia’ translates as ‘Illusion to Joy’ and is an Embodied Alchemy concept Ella created for empowering creatives to release their fears, re-connect to their passion and power, and create a life of joy. Ella is also championing a wellness project called Business Yoga which is all about supporting companies to put wellbeing at the heart of their ethos.

Ella has studied yoga since 2004, and trained to teach Vinyasa yoga with Abby Hoffman (Embodied Dancer Teacher Training) in 2011 (with a Gil Clarke Scholarship), then Kundalini at the Karam Kriya School in 2018 and in Yoga Trapeze® at the Yoga Teachers College® in 2020. Ella has also practised Ashtanga since 2015, and has trained in TRE, The Wheel Of Consent, Holistic Pelvic Care (under Tami Kent) and the coaching of William Whitecloud.

Contact Details:
Website: www.mayagandaia.com
Website: www.ellasmesma.co.uk

Facebook:
@EllaMesma
@MayaGandaia

Instagram:
@EllaMesma
@Maya_Gandaia

View all posts

Author - Ella Mesma

Womb Healing by Maya Gandaia

Discovering Holistic Pelvic Care I first discovered Holistic Pelvic Care via Tami Kent’s...