Risa, 2024
from the Portrait Project
In this film portrait we look intimately at renowned dancer and master-teacher, Risa Steinberg, in her New York City apartment as she reflects on her prolific and ongoing lifetime in the dance world.
Risa’s enormous depth of experience as a celebrated modern dancer, master-teacher and coach to contemporary choreographers brings a power and presence to the film, as well as her self-awareness in reckoning with her life as an artist.
All artists make tough choices, especially those who are singularly high-achieving. Risa shares an inner world in this portrait that is human, vulnerable and profoundly honest.
RISA STEINBERG is active in many facets of the dance community as a performer, teacher, re-constructor of the works of José Limón, rehearsal coach, and mentor to young, emerging, and established choreographers. A native New Yorker, Ms. Steinberg attended the High School of Performing Arts. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from The Juilliard School where she has served as full-time faculty since 2004 and held the position of Associate Director of Juilliard Dance from 2008-2016. Ms. Steinberg has been a guest teacher throughout the world, as well as many summer intensives including Arts Umbrella since 2017 and Impulstanz since 2001. In 2022, she received the DanceTeacherMagazine Award of Distinction.
As a performer, Ms, Steinberg was a principal dancer with the José Limón Dance Company, Bill Cratty Dance Theater, Annabelle Gamson, Anna Sokolow’s Player’s Project, Colin Connor, and American Repertory Dance Company of Los Angeles. She has also appeared as a guest artist with the companies of Wally Cardona, Sean Curran, Kate Weare, and DanzaHoy of Caracas, Venezuela, and as a cast member of Punchdrunk’s Sleep No More from 2015-2020. Her critically acclaimed solo concert, A Celebration of Dance, featured a repertory from Isadora Duncan to contemporary choreographers.
As a re-constructor of Limón works, Ms. Steinberg has worked with companies worldwide and dancers, including Rudolph Nureyev, Frank Augustyn, and Karen Kain. As a choreographic advisor, she has had the honor of mentoring choreographers including Brian Brooks, Kyle Abraham, Kate Weare, Michelle Dorrance and participants in the New York Choreographic Institute. Ms. Steinberg currently serves as the co-director of the Ann and Weston Hicks Choreography Project at Jacob’s Pillow.
WATCH Risa IN THE SCREENING ROOM
