Dancer, artist, and MacArthur Fellow Kyle Abraham to deliver convocation at Carleton

Kyle Abraham — award-winning dancer, MacArthur Fellow, and artistic director of A.I.M by Kyle Abraham — will deliver the convocation address on Friday, January 10 from 10:50 to 11:50 a.m. in Skinner Chapel. Abraham’s convocation address comes after a lecture and demonstration he and members of A.I.M will deliver on Thursday, January 9 at 7 p.m. as this winter’s Lucas Lecturer. The Ward Lucas Lecture Series in the Arts sponsors an annual series of public lectures, with previous speakers ranging from author Salman Rushdie (2013) to architect R. Buckminster Fuller (1968). 

Beyond his role as artistic director for A.I.M, Abraham was recently commissioned by the Royal Ballet, creating Optional Family (2021) and The Weathering (2022). Abraham has also previously created works with the New York City Ballet, including When We Fell (2021), which was praised by The New York Times as “among the most beautiful dance films of the pandemic”; the American Ballet Theater, including a solo work Ash (2019) for Misty Copeland; Hubbard Street Dance Chicago; the National Ballet of Cuba; and many more. Through A.I.M, Abraham has created more than just art — A.I.M for Change is an organized initiative providing support and resources for the betterment of the Black community, with the goal to create healthy and equitable change and fight oppression. 

Through his career in dance and choreography, Abraham has received glowing admiration for his contribution to the disciplines. Rebecca Bengal of Vogue quoted former artistic director of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater Robert Battle in saying, “What Abraham brings… is an avant-garde aesthetic, an original and politically minded downtown sensibility that doesn’t distinguish between genres but freely draws on a vocabulary that is as much Merce and Martha as it is Eadweard Muybridge and Michael Jackson.” Beyond his MacArthur Genius Grant, Abraham has been awarded the Doris Duke Award (2016), and a Princess Grace Statue Award, among many others. Abraham has also notably worked with Beyoncé as a choreographer for her 2013 Vogue cover shoot, blending high fashion with her iconic artistic style. 

Abraham earned his BFA from SUNY Purchase, his MFA from NYU Tisch School of the Arts, and an honorary Doctorate in Fine Arts from Washington Jefferson College. 

This convocation will not be accessible through Zoom. Carleton convocations are free and open to the public. Find upcoming events and archived recordings (including in podcast form) on the convocations website. For more information, including disability accommodations, call 507-222-5461 or email nponder@carleton.edu. There will be no luncheon after Abraham’s address; convocation luncheons will resume Friday, January 17.