Christopher Williams

Christopher Williams, dubbed “the downtown prodigy” (The New Yorker) and “one of the most exciting choreographic voices out there” (The New York Times), is a choreographer, dancer, and puppeteer devoted to crafting movement-based works in New York City and abroad since 1999.  His works have been presented in New York City venues including City Center, Dance Theater Workshop, Danspace Project, Joyce SoHo, Symphony Space, Judson Church, the 92nd Street Y, HERE Arts Center, P.S. 122, Dance New Amsterdam, Dixon Place, La Mama, the Mulberry Street Theater, the Spiegeltent, nationally in Kalamazoo, Philadelphia, Princeton, Carlisle, and internationally in Colombia, Holland, France, England, Spain, and Russia. His recent collaborators include director Peter Sellars, composer Gregory Spears, visual artist/costume designer Andrew Jordan, and members of various early music ensembles including Anonymous 4, Lionheart, and the Ensemble Pygmalion.  He has been commissioned by Perm Opera & Ballet Theater, NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Princeton University, Dickinson University, The Harkness Dance Festival, Dance Theater Workshop, and through the Dream Music Puppetry Program as part of the HERE Artist Residency Program.  He has received fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts, The Foundation for Contemporary Arts, and The Bogliasco Foundation, as well as multiple grants from the Jim Henson Foundation, the O’Donnell-Green Music & Dance Foundation, and the Greenwall Foundation.  He has also held creative residencies at the Watermill Center, Movement Research, Joyce SoHo, Dance New Amsterdam, Djerassi Resident Artists Program, White Oak Plantation, Yaddo, and The Yard.  In 2005, he received a New York Dance & Performance “Bessie” Award for his work Ursula and the 11,000 Virgins.  He holds degrees from Sarah Lawrence College and the École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in Paris, and has since performed for Tere O’Connor Dance, Douglas Dunn & Dancers, Yoshiko Chuma & the School of Hard Knocks, John Kelly, Rebecca Lazier, Basil Twist, and Dan Hurlin, among others.

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