VoyageLA Interview: Hidden Gems: Meet Susan Vishmid of Freaks With Lines

Susy V

Aug 18

4 min read

Updated: Aug 23

Today we’d like to introduce you to Susan Vishmid.

VoyageLA: Susan, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?

SV: I started ballet at age 4 when my mom took me to Westside School of Ballet in Santa Monica, CA. Through scholarships I continued training at the Pacific Northwest Ballet School, San Francisco Ballet School and The Rock School. I danced with the Pennsylvania Ballet, Santa Fe Opera, San Diego Opera, Chicago Festival Ballet, Napoles Ballet Theater, California Contemporary Ballet, City of Angels Ballet, California Riverside Ballet, Key West Ballet, Coast City Ballet and San Gorgonio Ballet. I had the privilege of working with several esteemed choreographers including Kenneth von Heidecke, Nicola Bowie, Jodi Melnick and Kitty McNamee in Samson & Delilah, Aida, A Masked Ball, Romeo & Juliette, Capriccio and La Traviata respectively.

Currently I am the Artistic Director, Choreographer and Executive Producer at Freaks With Lines, an avant garde ballet company I started in 2017 based here in Los Angeles. From Freaks With Lines came its training component, Freaks In Training (F.I.T.) where I integrate my vast movement background into a unique adult ballet program. I teach all levels and welcome adult ballet beginners in addition to dancers who may have left ballet many years ago but still have that desire to dance and move. F.I.T. is built on thoughtful instruction, honest feedback and real growth where students can expect specific corrections, individualized attention, and the sort of breakthroughs that keep dancers of all levels coming back. Afterall, the correction is the compliment.

I am also a registered yoga and certified Pilates instructor and offer private coaching for ballet and Pilates.

VLA: Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?

SV: Anyone who says it’s a smooth road to success is painfully naive and sorely mistaken.

Navigating through injuries, politics, egos and the pure grit associated with the ballet has certainly complicated things. However, there is nothing I would not do for my beloved art. Tenacity is the road to success and it is a bumpy one. The genesis of Freaks With Lines stems from seeing a lack of substantial opportunities for talented and classically trained dancers in Los Angeles. Freaks With Lines more than just a dance company; it is a laboratory where professional dancers can create on each other and begin to really take agency over the entire creative process from the production to the choreography to the dissemination and distribution of our beloved art. We are indeed consumers of our own craft. Freaks In Training (F.I.T.), the training component spinoff Freaks With Lines is gaining recognition and is well on its way to making its mark among the tightly knit dance community here in Los Angeles as an effective ballet program focusing on adult ballet dancers, many of whom are total beginners. F.I.T. offers personalized and constructive feedback, which is based on a strong understanding of biomechanics. Instruction is delivered in a friendly, witty yet concise manner. An environment that emphasizes placement and clean technique is perfect for any dancer to thrive from the recreational dancer to professional dancer.

The progress I observed firsthand in my F.I.T. dancers over the last several years is extraordinary. F.I.T. dancers are obsessed with getting better and building good technique and they understand the focus and grit this requires. It takes a Freak to train a Freak! Do You Have It In You? Let us know on instagram!

VLA: As you know, we’re big fans of Freaks With Lines. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?

SV: My company, Freaks With Lines (FWL) is a Los Angeles dance company and a training platform built for dancers who are obsessed with the work and uninterested in the gatekeeping. FWL exists at the intersection of classical rigor and creative irreverence. We collaborate with dancers, choreographers, and artists across disciplines to produce work that lives within the ballet tradition and disrupts it at the same time.

A Freak doesn’t refer to a type of dancer– it’s a state of mind: passionate, precise, and completely consumed by the pursuit of creating the most perfect lines physically possible.As dancers we are the creators and the consumers of our own art. The story, no matter how abstract, is always in the lines.

The training component to FWL, Freaks In Training (F.I.T.) is built on thoughtful instruction, honest feedback and real growth where students can expect specific corrections, individualized attention, and the sort of breakthroughs that keep dancers of all levels coming back. Afterall, the correction is the compliment because when something clicks, it changes everything and isn’t that why we are here?

VLA: Let’s talk about our city – what do you love? What do you not love?

SV: I like that there are so many different little neighborhoods in Los Angeles. I love that there is always something to do and I love that it is a mecca for creatives.

I strongly dislike the traffic because it deters from the desire to go out and explore and discover new pockets of Los Angeles. The other thing I dislike is that too many people in LA believe they are truly creatives or artists. Yes there are many talented creatives in our city but there are even more fakes who are nothing but smoke and mirrors and through the use of social media somehow still manage to “make it.” This frustrates me greatly.

I also don’t like how ridiculously expensive everything has become. Renting studio space is probably my biggest expense and it is getting increasingly difficult to continue doing business.

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