Robert Battle, former inventive director of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.
Photograph courtesy Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
The Board of Trustees of Alvin Ailey Dance Basis introduced final Thursday that Robert Battle, inventive director of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater since 2011, has knowledgeable them that he must concentrate on his well being and has submitted his resignation.
The board mentioned it has accepted Battle’s resignation “with remorse,” stating that Battle will stay obtainable to the Board by means of Dec. 31, 2023.
“Robert Battle has served the Ailey group with expertise, verve and distinction over the previous dozen years,” mentioned Daria Wallach, chair of the Ailey Board of Trustees. “The board, the corporate, the workers, and the dance world acknowledge and applaud the contributions he has made to increasing the repertoire, fostering the work of choreographers, supporting Ailey’s wide-ranging training actions, and serving as an envoy for dance. We provide him our warmest gratitude.”
Battle mentioned, “The private {and professional} bonds I’ve solid at Ailey working with the corporate’s distinctive dancers and so many different nice artists will at all times imply the world to me, however I do know that is the proper second for me to maneuver on and concentrate on my well being.
“I look again on these previous 12 years with heat and gratitude,” he added.
The inspiration mentioned Affiliate Creative Director Matthew Speeding, supported by Ailey’s inventive workforce, will take duty for main the corporate in its upcoming vacation engagement at New York Metropolis Heart.
“Ailey now enters a interval of transition, because the Board begins the search to determine a brand new inventive director,” the assertion mentioned. “The group does so from a place of power, as Ailey kicks off an thrilling sixty fifth anniversary season.”
About Robert Battle
Robert Battle grew to become inventive director of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in July 2011 after being personally chosen by Judith Jamison, making him solely the third individual to go the corporate because it was based in 1958.
Battle has a long-standing affiliation with the Ailey group. A frequent choreographer and artist in residence at Ailey since 1999, the Basis mentioned he has set lots of his works on Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Ailey II, and at The Ailey College.
The corporate’s present repertory consists of his ballets Ella, For 4, In/Facet, Love Tales finale, Mass, and Unfold.
Along with increasing the Ailey repertory with works by artists as various as Kyle Abraham, Aszure Barton, Mauro Bigonzetti, Ronald Okay. Brown, Camille A. Brown, Rennie Harris, Paul Taylor, and Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, the Basis mentioned Battle has additionally instituted Ailey’s New Instructions Choreography Lab to assist develop the following era of choreographers.
The Basis mentioned Battle’s journey to the highest of the fashionable dance world started within the Liberty Metropolis neighborhood of Miami, Florida.
“He confirmed inventive expertise early and studied dance at a highschool arts magnet program earlier than transferring on to Miami’s New World College of the Arts, underneath the route of Daniel Lewis and Gerri Houlihan, and eventually to the dance program at The Juilliard College, underneath the route of Benjamin Harkarvy, the place he met his mentor, Carolyn Adams,” the Basis mentioned.
It mentioned Battle danced with Parsons Dance from 1994 to 2001, and in addition set his choreography on that firm beginning in 1998.
Battle then based his personal Battleworks Dance Firm, which made its debut in 2002 in Düsseldorf, Germany, because the US consultant to the World Dance Alliance’s World Meeting.
The Basis mentioned Battleworks subsequently carried out extensively at venues together with The Joyce Theater, Dance Theater Workshop, American Dance Competition and Jacob’s Pillow Dance Competition.
Battle was honored as one of many “Masters of African American Choreography” by the Kennedy Heart for the Performing Arts in 2005, and he obtained the distinguished Statue Award from the Princess Grace Basis-USA in 2007, the Basis mentioned.
