Sarah Michelson

Since the late 1990s, British-born, New York–based choreographer, dancer, and artist Sarah Michelson (b. 1964) has come to be known for choreographic work that engages notions of process, physicality, immediacy, and impermanence. Drawing from personal and dance history, her formally rigorous, incisive, often humorous performances defy genre in their expansive interrogation of dance, situational context, and the roles of choreographer and dancer; artist and audience.

Michelson’s scrupulously prepared performances are experienced as fleeting, singular events, defying easy legibility or reproducibility. Her work moreover examines the possibilities afforded by questioning, problematizing, and challenging what dance is and can be, while evincing a devotional commitment to dance and the efforts of its performers and the broader dance community.

The artist received a BA in literature from the University of London’s Goldsmiths College in 1984; a performance diploma from Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, London, in 1985; and an MFA in fiction writing from Mills College, Oakland, California, in 1990. After moving to New York in the early 1990s, Michelson was a student of dancer and choreographer Merce Cunningham.

Michelson’s work has been commissioned and presented by notable institutions, including the Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, Wales; Danspace Project, New York; The Kitchen, New York; Lower Manhattan Cultural Center’s River to River Festival, New York; Movement Research, New York; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; On the Boards, Seattle; Performance Space New York; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

In January 2023, Sarah Michelson: /\ March 2020 (4pb), an exhibition featuring the artist’s first object-based work, opened at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. Created specifically for the gallery space, the installation was also the first work by the artist to be acquired by a museum.

The choreographer’s work has toured internationally, including to the ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena, California; Biennale Danza, Venice; Cutting Edge Festival, Frankfurt; Institute of Contemporary Art, London; Sommerszene Salzburg, Austria; Tanz im August, Berlin; tanzhaus nrw Düsseldorf, Germany; and Zürcher Theater Spektakel, where she was awarded the Förderpreis in 2002.

She has created several evening-length pieces throughout her career, beginning with Cindy Camille Sheila and Shirley (1989), and modular works, including recent works tournamento (Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2015); For James Tyson (The Kitchen, New York, 2015); September2017/\ (Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, Bard College, Annandale-On-Hudson, New York, 2017); February2018/\, (Theater Kampnagel Hamburg, Germany, 2018); May2018/\ (Performance Space New York, 2018); and June2019/\ (River to River Festival, New York, 2019).

Michelson has received two Bessie Awards for her choreography (2002 and 2003) and one for visual design (2007). She has been the recipient of other significant awards and fellowships, such as a MacArthur Fellowship (2019); a Bucksbaum Award (2012); a Doris Duke Artist Award (2012); a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship (2010); a Guggenheim Fellowship (2009); a Grants to Artists award from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts (2008); and The Herb Alpert Award in the Arts (2006). The choreographer has also taken part in numerous residencies, including the Joyce Theater Foundation, New York (2012); Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2012); Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (2013 and 2015); Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York (2014–2017); The New School, New York (2015); Lower Manhattan Cultural Center, New York (2019); and The Museum of Modern Art, New York (2024).

The artist has served as associate director of Movement Research (1997–2000), where she continues to serve on the board of directors, editor of Performance Journal (1995–2003), and as associate curator of performance at The Kitchen, New York, where she currently serves on the advisory board.

Michelson has been represented by David Zwirner since 2023. Over the course of five days in October 2021, Michelson performed Oh No Game Over at David Zwirner, New York, which was developed across several months, while she used the gallery as a working studio space. Her first solo presentation since the gallery’s representation was announced took place in 2024 as a series of performances held over two days at David Zwirner, Los Angeles.