Bio
Former member of the Batsheva Dance Company in Israel and Gus Solomons, Pearl Lang, and Paul Sanasardo dance companies in New York. Performed solo works by Viola Farber, Beverly Blossom, Anna Sokolov, Murray Louis and Charles Weidman. Established Douglas Nielsen Dances in 1982. Internationally known teacher, choreographer, peformer, director. Associated with The American Dance Festival since 1986 at Duke University and in China, Korea, Russia, Czech Republic, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, and Mongolia. Received the 2003 Lester Horton Dance Educator Award for excellence in teaching (presented by Donald McKayle), and the 2007 ADF Balasaraswati/Joy Ann Dewey Beinecke Chair for Distinguished Teaching. Adjudicator for The American College Dance Festival in Virginia, Texas, Idaho, Kansas, Connecticut, California, and Wisconsin. Distinguished panelist for the Los Angeles Music Center Spotlight Awards, The National Association for the Advancement of the Arts, the Los Angeles County Arts Commission and the McKnight Foundation. Residencies abroad include the Centre National de Danse Contemporaine (Angers/France), L'ecole-Atelier Rudra Bejart Lausanne (Switzerland), Dansens Hus (Copenhagen), The Beijing Dance Adademy (China), University of Chile (Santiago), Palucca Schule (Dresden, Germany), University of the Americas (Mexico). Recipient of four fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and a Performing arts fellowship with the Arizona Commission on the Arts.
