Aszure Barton

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Aszure Barton is a Canadian-American dance maker whose work has been described by the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts as “watching the physical unfurling of the human psyche.” Beginning tap at age three, she has created dances for as long as she can remember. Her works have appeared on stages worldwide, including the Palais Garnier, Mariinsky Theater, The Kennedy Center, Studio 54, Lincoln Center, and Sadler’s Wells, and in exhibitions such as the Smithsonian’s Cultural Expressions. She has also choreographed for theater, film, opera, and Broadway.

In the early 2000s, Barton founded Aszure Barton & Artists (AB&A) in New York, reimagining choreographer–company structures as “a mobile home for trusted humans.” Born out of rebellion and a desire to bring people together, the company serves as an autonomous, interdisciplinary, and collaborative ground for process.

Through AB&A, Barton has collaborated with celebrated artists—including Mikhail Baryshnikov, Jessica Chastain, Misty Copeland, Alan Cumming, and Cyndi Lauper—and with preeminent companies and institutions such as American Ballet Theatre, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Bayerisches Staatsballett, English National Ballet, Grand Théâtre de Genève, Martha Graham Dance Company, National Ballet of Canada, Nederlands Dans Theater, Sydney Dance Company, and Teatro alla Scala, among many others.

While AB&A remains her creative home, Barton is also presently Resident Artist at Hubbard Street Dance Chicago and House Choreographer for Gauthier Dance | Theaterhaus Stuttgart.

Barton premiered Mere Mortals at San Francisco Ballet with British musician and DJ Floating Points, longtime collaborator Michelle Jank, and mixed-media artists Hamill Industries. Curated by Director Tamara Rojo, the piece marked the first evening-length work created by a woman in the company’s history.

She maintains an ongoing collaboration with trumpeter and composer Ambrose Akinmusire. Together, they have created a range of works, including commissions for Limón Dance Company, Hamburg Ballett, The Juilliard School, and others. Their most recent work, A a | a B : B E N D, premiered at Germany’s Kampnagel, had its U.S. premiere in 2025, and will soon debut in Canada. The work continues to tour globally through a creative collaboration with Pomegranate Arts. Tanz Magazine described it as “a refusal of categorization that draws its appeal from two artists who, completely secure in their fields, playfully unsettle each other.”

Barton returned to the Baryshnikov Arts for its 20th-anniversary season alongside Benjamin Millepied as an inaugural choreographer commissioned by the organization, in recognition of her longtime collaboration with Mikhail Baryshnikov and the Center.

Her accolades include a Bessie Award, recognition as the inaugural Martha Duffy Resident Artist at Baryshnikov Arts, and the Arts & Letters Award of Canada, joining the likes of Margaret Atwood, Karen Kain, and Oscar Peterson. A laureate of the Ken McCarter Award for Distinguished NBS Alumni, she also holds the title of Official Ambassador of Contemporary Choreography in Canada.

As an educator, Barton is Creative Partner with Boston Conservatory at Berklee and was formerly Artist-in-Residence at USC Kaufman during William Forsythe’s tenure as Artistic Advisor. She also maintains longstanding educational collaborations with Canada’s National Ballet School, Arts Umbrella, and The Juilliard School in New York.

“I believe that care transforms creation and can live at its center: care for those we create with and those we create for.” — Aszure Barton

Career

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Aszure Barton was born and raised in Alberta, Canada. She received her formal training at the National Ballet School in Toronto, where, as a student, she helped originate the ongoing Stephen Godfrey Choreographic Showcase. To date, she has collaborated with and created works for Mikhail Baryshnikov, Ekaterina Shipulina/Bolshoi Ballet, The National Ballet of Canada,[1] Houston Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, The Martha Graham Dance Company,[2] Nederlands Dans Theater, Sydney Dance Company, Ballet British Columbia, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, The Juilliard School, Les Ballets Jazz de Montréal (Resident Choreographer 2005-08)[3] and English National Ballet.[4] Other work includes choreography for the Broadway revival production of The Threepenny Opera.[2] Her work has been described as "offer[ing] an entire world, full of surprise and humor, emotion and pain, expressed through a dance vocabulary that takes ballet technique and dismantles it to near-invisibility" by the New York Times.[5]

She is the founder and director of Aszure Barton & Artists, an international dance project, and her works continue to tour to Europe, Asia, and Africa as well as Argentina, Brazil, Canada, and the United States. She has been an artist in residence at The Baryshnikov Arts Center.[6]

In its review of a 2011 performance, The Buffalo News says that Barton and her company "let flow wave after wave of idiosyncratic movement that vacillated from elegantly graceful to stylized clowning and the outright bizarre."[7]

References

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  1. ^ Ross, Oakland (November 22, 2009). "Choreographer Aszure Barton: A woman in motion". Toronto Star. Retrieved October 18, 2011.
  2. ^ a b "Aszure Barton Biography". Aszure and Artists. Archived from the original on September 4, 2011. Retrieved July 17, 2011.
  3. ^ Asantewaa, Eva Yaa (April 2008). "Aszure Barton". Dance Magazine. ISSN 0011-6009. Archived from the original on June 23, 2011. Retrieved July 17, 2011.
  4. ^ "Fantastic Beings by Aszure Barton". English National Ballet. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  5. ^ Sulcas, Roslyn (2007-04-19). "Latin-African Textures, and Ballet Dismantled". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-02-28.
  6. ^ Milzoff, Rebecca (December 12, 2010). "Look at Me". New York Magazine. ISSN 0028-7369. Retrieved October 18, 2011.
  7. ^ Sucato, Steve (October 13, 2011). "Program displays Barton's quirkiness". The Buffalo News. Retrieved October 16, 2011.
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