Artistic Director

Ellen Cornfield Ellen Cornfield, choreographer, dancer, teacher, has been working in her field for forty years. Her childhood was spent playing and singing in the expansive outdoor space of the Virginia countryside. She began modern dance training (Graham Technique) in 1968 at the University of California at Berkeley, performed in the University Company, and by her fourth and last year was teaching Graham technique to a beginning class. She moved to New York City to study and perform with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company (1974—1982), with whom she toured the world and earned a reputation as one of the foremost Cunningham dancers of her generation. Following her tenure with MCDC, Ellen worked as a guest artist at numerous universities throughout the US and with several small companies, choreographing, teaching and performing. She formed Cornfield Dance in 1989 to support her choreographic investigations.

Cornfield has traveled with her company throughout the US, Canada, Europe and Japan, bringing her lush and elegant choreography to new audiences, performing in theaters, universities, as well as outdoor and public spaces. She is a master teacher, and has taught at many of the word’s major dance institutions, including North Carolina School of the Arts, Harvard Summer Dance Center, SUNY Purchase, Ohio State University, Hofstra University, and the University of California at Berkeley. Internationally she has taught at The Place and the Laban Institute in London, at the Rotterdamse Dansacademie in Holland, and for several European companies including Ballet Rambert in London, Companie Emile Dubois in Grenoble, France and for Charlesleroi Danses in Charleroi, Belgium.

Cornfield’s superb dancers, with whom she works in a collaborative process, embrace and illuminate the dynamic, athletic, and legible movement language that supports the arc of Cornfield’s choreographic investigations. She has a BA in History from UC Berkeley and an MA in Performance Studies from New York University, and is on the roster of the Pentacle Gallery in NYC.