Morgan Thorson, contemporary experimental dancemaker, is a nationally recognized choregrapher based in the Twin Cities. She currently teaches in the U of MN Dance Dept.
Morgan will join us to create a solo for dance major, Torre Edahl, to be shown as part of the Dance Comps concert project in Spring Term (April 18, 19).
Morgan Thorson investigates movement and the body as a purveyor of culturally, socially and kinesthetically relevant life experience. Her stage productions combine movement, light, sound and objects; always considering the representation of the body, the work of her collaborators and her relationship to the history of the field. Her work is a form of itinerant labor that is crafted through the process of entering, sharing and leaving communities world-wide.
Since 2002, Morgan Thorson has taught a variety of contemporary dance forms at University of Minnesota. She has also been teaching interdisciplinary courses in Religion, Drawing and Archaeology at Wesleyan University since 2010. She is a certified practitioner of Skinner Releasing Technique.
Morgan is a 2011 USA Artists Friends Fellow. She has received many awards for her work including the Fused Program in 2011, The Guggenheim Fellowship in 2010, The McKnight Fellowship in Choreography in 2009 & 2002, The Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography (MANCC) Fellowship in 2009 and 2011; and The Jerome Foundation from 1998-2007. In 2012, she was in residence at the Centre Choreographique National De Franche-Comte in Belfort, France, and a MacDowell Artist Colony Fellow.
Morgan was “Best Choreographer” of 2010 awarded by the Minneapolis-St. Paul City Pages for her work, Heaven, commissioned by Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Performance Space 122 in New York and DiverseWorks in Houston. In 2007 she created the site-specific work Docudrama for which she received a 2007 Sage Award for Outstanding Choreography and “Best Choreographer” of 2008 by the City Pages. Her work Faker, commissioned by Walker Art Center, received a 2006 Sage Award for Outstanding Choreography as well. Other honors also include 2010 Dance To Go award; and The Bessie Schonberg Memorial Fellowship in 2004, and commissions from James Sewell Ballet and Zenon Dance Company.