About
Julia K. Gleich has long issued an advisory to the code and conduct deemed proper by classical ballet—a form ruled historically by a patriarchy. Her work takes on what cultural anthropologist Victor Turner calls the liminoid state “a messy, non-binary state” which is “this or that or that” and not merely “this or not this.” Institutions prefer the liminal, new art lives in the liminoid. And this has been the tension in Gleich’s creative life - how to embrace the dance world without (its his-stories) succumbing to a governing institutional identity. She also connects with her field through producing programs of dance, researching her own vector movement theory, and writing about philosophical concerns around canon.
As the founder and Artistic Director of Gleich Dances she as been making dances for 25 years and is motivated by working in collaboration, and by illuminating the relationships between the traditional and the contemporary, scrapping aesthetic labels. After 15 years living and teaching in London, she returned to New York City and premiered the full evening ballet Martha (The Searchers) in collaboration with Guggenheim Fellow Elana Herzog.
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Gleich has choreographed six evening-length ballets and a Nutcracker, produced annually in Utah. Her company, Gleich Dances, has received critical notice in the New York Times, Village Voice, Brooklyn Rail, New Criterion, and dancelog.nyc, among others. She consistently develops new work in collaboration with visual artists, scientists, mathematicians, and musicians. She is a co-Founder of Norte Maar for Collaborative Projects in the Arts, based in Brooklyn, NY and teaches at Peridance Capezio.
Gleich was Head of Choreography (2005-2017) at London Studio Centre, a BA(Hons) conservatoire programme, and on faculty of Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance (2003-2017).
Her research on vector movement theories is published in the Dynamic Body in Space. She was external examiner for Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts. Awards include: Vector Solo--Philadelphia Dancescreen Festival 2016, Choreographic Observership from DanceUK in 2016, and the Distinguished Alumni Award, University of Utah 2014. In 2013 she received an Arts Council England major grant.
Gleich has presented at the Laban International Conference, DSA(SDHS), CORPS de Ballet International, and the Higher Education Association and Middlesex University, UK. In 2014 she was honored with an invitation by the Brooklyn Museum to speak alongside Neuroscientist Karim Nader, and visual artist Shimon Attie, on intersections in art and science and the poetic concept of memory. Gleich received her MFA in Dance from the University of Utah and danced free-lance across the US including for Tri-Cities Opera, Ballet Binghamton, Wisconsin Dance Ensemble, Utah Ballet, among others.
Ms. Gleich is also a founder and director of Aegis Live Arts, creating unique locational dance works that enliven history and architecture in London. She is a regular master teacher for Burklyn Ballet Theatre, VT, teaching workshops in contemporary ballet practice and generating new works in contemporary ballet. Her practice-based research on vectors and dance has been presented at the Laban International Conference in London, at the CORPS de Ballet International Conference, and was published in the Dynamic Body in Space.
Commissions include choreography for Island Moving Company, University of California-Irvine, and University of Northern Colorado-Greeley. In 2002 Gleich was a ballet busker on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh.
For 13 years she produced the annual London Studio Centre/Central St. Martin’s College of Art and Design dance and design collaborations that result in fully produced student choreographed evenings of dance at the Cochrane Theatre and later at the new Platform Theater in Kings Cross. She has taught company class for Michael Clark Company on the largest dance floor in Europe at Tate Modern Turbine Hall.
She has been on faculties of the University of Utah Ballet Department and Manhattanville College and Molloy College in New York. Ms. Gleich earned an MFA from the University of Utah and MA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She was on the Board of Directors for the American Dance Guild and has been a project evaluator for the Queens Council on the Arts, the Wisconsin Arts Council, and the Arts and Humanities Research Council, UK. Ms. Gleich’s early training includes the School of American Ballet and with Melissa Hayden, Robert Denvers, David Howard, and later, Peff Modelski. She also studied at the Limón Institute and Cunningham Studio. Ms. Gleich danced in regional ballet and modern dance companies across the US and was a Ballet Mistress for Utah Ballet and Ballet West.
About Gleich Dances
Gleich Dances began as A Coterie of Dancers in 1993 in Jackson Hole (WY) thanks to the Arts on the Hill Dance Festival which invited the company back over three summers. In 1995, the company, now Gleich Dances, relocated to New York City, later enjoying two seasons produced by NYC’s JoyceSoHo (’01, ’03). The company has performed throughout the United States and in the UK.
Gleich’s site specific dance works include performances in drained pools, on piers, in train stations and an annual stint in the Walmart parking lot in Plattsburgh, NY (’04, ’05, ’06,’07). She was commissioned to create a site-specific work for the opening of St. Pancras International train station in 2007. The company collaborates with composers, musicians, designers, directors and writers.
About Norte Maar
In 2004, Ms. Gleich with curator Jason Andrew founded Norte Maar for Collaborative Projects in the Arts with a mission to renew and refresh the exchange between the interdisciplinary arts. Highlights of the legacy of Norte Maar include CounterPointe since 2011 and The Brooklyn Combine.