The Workshop
The Workshop
The Workshop
The Workshop

Houston Thomas – During this week-long intensive, dancers will have the opportunity to work closely with choreographer Houston Thomas, engaging with selected excerpts from his choreographic repertoire. Participants will explore movement material drawn from Thomas’s existing works and develop new ideas through guided movement workshops.

Sidra Bell – Dancers will work durationally and improvisationally. Rehearsals will unfold in a circular structure – with Bell moving among the dancers rather than directing from the front – encouraging artists to respond to one another and take creative ownership of the work. Improvisation is a central tool in her practice, helping dancers reconnect with play, spontaneity, and instinct while building complex movement ideas through experimentation and dialogue.

Jim Vincent – NACHO DUATO Repertory – Nacho Duato is a renowned Spanish contemporary ballet choreographer, celebrated for an earthy, sensual, and deeply musical style that seamlessly fuses classical technique with contemporary fluidity. His work is marked by passionate emotional expression, featuring flowing movement, intense physicality, and grounded, often athletic partnering. Through his choreography, Duato frequently explores human relationships, love, and loss, with a profound sensitivity to musical nuance. His works dwell delicately on human vulnerability, revealing the full expressive potential of the dancer’s body. As we dig (literally) into Nacho’s work together, some of the main objectives will be to understand the how and why movement is shaped and ultimately delivered. Intention is critically important in his work; it needs to be expressed with definition and clarity. We will be focusing on what’s beyond the architecture and design of his movement.

Omar Román De Jesús – This workshop invites dancers to challenge their physical instincts and mental patterns through layered improvisational tasks. Each session is designed to heighten body awareness, shake off limiting thought, and unlock the infinite creative possibilities within every individual. These classes center technique as a living, responsive practice while inviting dancers to rediscover their bodies as sites of intuition, imagination, and play. The discoveries that emerge through these improvisational structures don’t stay in the realm of exploration — they directly inform how we build choreography. We investigate how spontaneous choices, unexpected pathways, and deeply felt physical impulses can be shaped into clear compositional tools. Participants are invited to explore how Omar’s movement language is rooted in sensation, emotional texture, and dynamic contrast, and how improvisation can become a bridge between personal expression and crafted performance.

Courtney Richardson – DAVID DAWSON Repertory – Dancers will dive into repertoire by internationally acclaimed British choreographer David Dawson, whose work is celebrated for pushing classical ballet to its limits while rooting every movement in deep emotional truth. His choreography is atmospheric, layered, and intensely detailed — demanding both mental and physical agility from every dancer. Our process will reflect that same spirit: immersive and exploratory, moving intentionally through the material to find the why behind each phrase. This is not a week of simply learning steps — it is a week of learning how to inhabit a movement world.

Glenn Edgerton – JIŘÍ KYLIÁN Repertory – The Kylián workshop will engage dancers in an immersive experience delving into the movement language of Jiří Kylián, guided by Glenn Edgerton, renowned coach and former director of both Nederlands Dans Theater 1 and Hubbard Street Dance Chicago. Edgerton’s career spanned dancing Kylian’s works while at The Joffrey Ballet and at NDT, then staging and rehearsing Kylian’s repertory while directing NDT 1 and HSDC. Kylián’s movement requires both classical clarity and grounded, expressive physicality often involving intricate partnering, and a deep sensitivity to musical structure. Throughout the week, dancers will explore nuanced details through intensive rehearsal and coaching, developing the control, musicality, and artistry that reveal the depth and humanity of Kylián’s choreography.

Jill Johnson – FORSYTHE Improvisational Technologies – In an environment that aims to support creative process and experimentation with an equal curiosity about both success and failure, this workshop week seeks to cultivate invention and foster the courage of artistry. Participant artists will develop choreographic improvisation and composition skills, including artistic discernment, interpretive ability, musicality, counterpoint, critical analysis, and communication for creative practice and collaboration. The workshop offers the opportunity to gain experience with Forsythe repertory, improvisation technologies and compositional practice through guided, task-based and collaborative research with interdisciplinary reference points and multi-faceted perspectives guided by a long-time collaborator and primary source.

Keerati Jinakunwiphat – With the intention of preparing, organizing, and freeing our bodies, Keerati’s creative process begins with connecting to our sense of self. In this presence, we begin to explore phrase work that emphasizes tactility, circularity, directionality, and shifts of weight. As we begin to unpack and rearrange material to explore new patterns and pathways together, we discover the cause and effect of movement between one another. In this dance making, we are exploring autonomy while simultaneously building community. Diving into various compositional structures, we play with the communication of many moving parts, shape and form, and how we can stay present as we take up and share the space with each other.

Cindy Welik-Salgado – CRYSTAL PITE Repetiteur – KIDD PIVOT Improvisation Tools – This week-long intensive is intended for professional dancers interested in learning both unison and group partnering repertoire from Crystal Pite’s “Dark Matters” taught by repetiteur and former Kidd Pivot member Cindy Welik-Salgado. Cindy will also be teaching warm-up classes that incorporate Kidd Pivot improvisation tools, leaning more heavily on partnering exercises. Dark Matters “emerg(ed) out of Pite’s curiosity and fascination with the unseen forces at work on mind and body.” The chosen excerpt requires teamwork, precision, and recklessness. This week will be an opportunity to play with the concepts of “being danced”, raising the stakes, and finding a balance between instinct and intellect which have shaped many of Pite’s creations.

Babatunji – We will explore floorwork techniques for dancers influenced by the dynamic movement language of breakdancing, alongside weight sharing and partnering inspired by the physical intelligence of wrestling. Complex movements will be broken down to their simplest elements, creating a clear and safe pathway toward executing larger, more daring movement.