Who We Are

Basement Stair Collective is Claire Elizabeth Aldridge, Kora Link, R.L. Routh, and Becca Wirta.

Mission Statement

Basement Stair Collective creates immersive new works through a collaborative, design-forward process, delving into the dark corners of the human experience to shed light on the spaces between grief and joy, the flesh and the soul, and the personal and the political. 

We are the child running up the stairs, and the monster chasing after them.

The four members of Basement Stair Collective stand together outside of the Clinton Street Theater in Portland, Oregon. The marquee above them shows that SKINSHOW is playing Saturday at 7:30, alongside their other programming.

Claire Elizabeth Aldridge (she/they) is a queer interdisciplinary artist based in Portland, OR. You will find her on any given midnight at the crossroads of dance, theater, poetry, and sculpture. Committed to collaboratively driven works that push the boundaries of form she has trained with the Portland Experimental Theatre Ensemble’s ICP, Dell Arte International School of Physical Theater and The American Conservatory Theater.

Claire stands in front of a brick wall. She is a white person with reddish brown hair that is pulled back and hidden under a green hood. They are wearing an olive green jumpsuit and dark sunglasses.

Kora Link (they/she) is a performer, musician, maker, mover & shaker based in the Portland area. Kora holds a Bachelors in Performance from Lewis & Clark College, and most recently attended and graduated from Portland Experimental Theatre Ensemble’s Institute of Contemporary Performance. As an artist, Kora is interested in themes of embodiment & ritual and melding the personal, spiritual and political to inspire change in the world through emergent changes within ourselves.

Kora stands in front of a brick wall. They are a white person with bobbed hair that is dyed a greenish teal. They are wearing a teal jumpsuit, a black baseball hat, and dark sunglasses, with a red flannel shirt tied around her waist.

R.L. Routh (they/them) is a performer and artist living and working in Portland, OR. They are an actor and theatre maker with backgrounds in Shakespeare, puppetry, and movement. They are inspired by art that is deeply personal and by the power in that vulnerability. They graduated from Southern Oregon University with a BFA in Theatre Arts, minors in both Shakespeare Studies and Gender, Sexuality, & Women’s Studies, and a handful of stage combat certifications. Since moving to Portland, they were a member of the 22-23 cohort of PETE’s Institute for Contemporary Performance.

R.L. stands in front of a brick wall. They are a white person with shaggy dark brown hair that has bleached patches by the ears. They are wearing a black jumpsuit with a brown plaid flannel shirt tied around their waist.

Becca Wirta (she/her) is a theatre artist, performer, and collaborator in Portland, Oregon. She is a member of Bedrock Theatre, connecting audiences to their environment and to each other through immersive storytelling in natural landscapes, as well as a founding member of Basement Stair Collective. Becca is a 2022/23 graduate of the Institute of Contemporary Performance with Portland Experimental Theatre Ensemble, where she has spent time honing her personal aesthetic grappling with aspects of loneliness, desire and change through a dual lens of femininity and decay. She is a graduate of Willamette University with Bachelor of Arts degrees in Theatre Performance as well as Rhetoric and Media Studies.

Becca stands in front of a brick wall. She is a white woman with straight blonde hair. She is wearing a dark blue jumpsuit, an orange baseball hat, and dark sunglasses.