Brianna Susan Smith is the founding Artistic Director of TAPROOT. A graduate of Catawba College with a BFA in Musical Theatre, Smith has worked as a performer, director, choreographer, technician and educator utilizing puppeteering, Viewpoints, cultural dance, yoga, and a wide range of theatre and dance styles.

Smith has worked as a collaborative artist on original performance works and adaptations with professional and youth organizations in the southeast. She has worked with students as young as three and as old as twenty-two on collaborative adaptations and performance pieces as a director and writer, and now works with local organizations offering workshops in devised methods and socially conscious theatre.

Smith works primarily with TAPROOT, a multi-disciplinary performance collective in Charlotte, NC. As a company TAPROOT travels around the South East performing devised work with an emphasis on collaboration and diverse styles and techniques. Their work incorporates, live projection, theatrical techniques, diverse dance styles, improvisation, original musical scores, and shadow to create pieces that speak truth into communities and immerse audiences in innovative experiences. Her work is built on collaborative and devised techniques and diverse training across artistic and academic disciplines.