Kelly Whalen

Kelly Whalen

Senior Video Producer

Kelly Whalen is a filmmaker and educator who directs and produces social justice documentaries and award-winning arts and culture web series. She is the creator of KQED Arts’ three-time Webby Award-winning YouTube series If Cities Could Dance, featuring dancers across the country representing their cities’ signature moves, and the director of When the Waters Get Deep, a documentary about Oakland-based artists SOL Development and their work toward healing their communities’ trauma from gun violence.

By Kelly Whalen
A collage of five Latinx dancers, each representing a different dance practice, with a banner in the front that says "If Cities Could Dance"

Five Dance Films to Celebrate Latinx Heritage Month

A capoeirista is sitting on a rock in front of the San Francisco Bay and is playing the berimbau.

Follow a Capoeirista’s Journey From the Bay Area to Brazil

Indigenous Enterprise Brings Powwow Dancing to the World Stage

A male dancer stands mid-pose with the Arizona mountains behind him during golden hour

In Tucson, Latinx Dancers Honor Migrant Stories From the Borderlands

Three women wearing traditional taiko player attire raise their arms to srike big taiko drums with wooden sticks.

Meet Women Drummers Keeping the Japanese Art of Taiko Strong

A split image with a black and white photograph of Mabel Fairbanks, a Black and Native figure skater, in her youth shown on the left, and an image of a teenage girl figure skating on the right.

Black Ice Skating Legends Inspire Today’s Olympic Hopefuls

Band members stand on a downtown Oakland rooftop and pose for the camera

These Oakland Artists Transformed their Greatest Pain into Purpose

A split screen image of choreographer Rennie Harris: a black and white photo of Rennie dancing in the 1990s on the left and a still from a sit down interview with Rennie taken in 2021 on the right.

How Hip-Hop Dance Legend Rennie Harris Came to Pioneer Street Dance Theater

A male and female couple are looking at the camera and smiling while a small crowd of people is dancing behind them.

Meet Philadelphia’s House Dancers Preserving the Soul of the Scene

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