Animikiikwe Couchie is an emerging multidisciplinary dance artist from Nipissing First Nation. She has engaged and worked with a number of large-scale community arts projects, including Like an Old Tale/Jumblies Theatre and Dances of Resistance/Aanmitaagzi. In 2013, Animikiikwe worked with acclaimed choreographer Penny Couchie’s dance theatre piece When Will You Rage?. She narrated and danced within her mother’s piece.

In 2015 she completed her studies at the Canadore College Theatre Arts Program. In May 2018 she completed her training at Ecole de Danse Contemporaine de Montreal. Since then, she had the opportunity to work with Bill Coleman in his interactive dance piece Felt. In June 2019, she had the opportunity to be a part of the Intercultural Indigenous Creation Lab at the Banff Centre for the Arts. In September 2019, she was apart of the remount of a play, Unnatural and Accidental Women, performed at the NAC, which marked the NAC’s Inaugural opening of Indigenous Theatre. She had the honour of choreographing Jumblies production What was My Backyard, directed by Beth Helmers, and performed in January of 2020.

In November 2020 and 2021 she was apart of the Aanimikiig Creators Unit and had the opportunity to develop her first dance piece, which was presented at the Waasageechak Begins to Dance Festival. She would like to thank her parents, Penny Couchie and Sid Bobb, and the many other arts organizations and artists for giving her the space and place to explore her art form within these projects.