William Forsythe (born December 30 1949 in New York City) is an American dancer and choreographer resident in Dresden in Saxony. He is known internationally for his work with the Frankfurt Ballet and his reorientation of classical ballet. Forsythe trained at the Joffrey Ballet, and the American Ballet Theatre in New York City (taking additional classes with Maggie Black, Finis Jung, Jonathan Watts, Meredith Baylis, William Griffith, Leon Danelion, Mme. Periaslavic, Mme. Boskovitch, Nolan Dingman, Pat Wilde, and Christa Long). After, he studied at the Jacksonville University, Florida (where he studied George Balanchine's and Martha Graham's techniques). In 1971, he joined the Joffrey Ballet, but when invited by the Stuttgart Ballet three years later, he left the Joffrey and moved to Europe when he was twenty-three as a dancer, and later became Resident Choreographer of the Stuttgart Ballet. This position he held until 1981, when he began pursuing an independent career. He also created works for ballet companies in Munich, The Hague, London, Basel, Berlin, Frankfurt am Main, Paris, New York and San Francisco. He choreographed "France/Dance" for Rudolf Nureyev at the Paris Opera Ballet during his career as Resident Choreographer. From 1984 to 2004, Forsythe was Director of the Frankfurt Ballet (Ballett Frankfurt), choreographing and arranging such seminal pieces such as "Artifact" (1984), "Impressing the Czar" (1988), "The Loss of Small Detail" (1991), "Endless House" (1999), and "Krammer/ Krammer" (2000). After its closure in 2004 he established, from the ashes of the Ballett Frankfurt, The Forsythe Company with the support of the states of Saxony and Hesse, the cities of Dresden and Frankfurt am Main, and private sponsors in a public-private co-operative venture. The Forsythe Company is based in Dresden and Frankfurt am Main and has a yearly residency at the Schiffbauhalle of the Schauspielhaus Zürich and also has an extensive international touring schedule.
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Choreography
Forsythe’s choreography is based in the engagement of contemporary visual arts, architecture and interactive multimedia with architectural and performance installations commissioned by Daniel Libeskind in Germany, Artangel in London, Creative Time in New York, and the City of Paris. His short film, "Solo", was presented at the 1997 Whitney Biennial. In 2006, a major exhibition of his performance, film and installation work was presented at the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich. Forsythe's early work has been performed by, among others, The Kirov, The New York City Ballet, The San Francisco Ballet, The National Ballet of Canada, The Royal Ballet Covent Garden and The Paris Opera Ballet. At the Frankfurt Ballet, he created many dance theatre works, such as "The Loss of Small Detail" (1991) in collaboration with composer Thom Willems and designer Issey Miyake, Gänge (1982), Artifact (1984), Impressing the Czar (1988), Limb’s Theorem (1990), A L I E / N A(C)TION (1992), Eidos: Telos (1995), Endless House (1999) and Kammer/Kammer (2000). His recent choreography has been for a piece called "Loss of Small Detail" with an associated exhibition at the Deutsches Hygiene Museum. 
Dance teaching
In 1994, Forsythe virtually reinvented the teaching of dance with his pioneering and award-winning computer application "Improvisation Technologies: A Tool for the Analytical Dance Eye" which is used by professional companies, dance conservatories, universities, postgraduate architecture programs and secondary schools. As an educator, Forsythe is regularly invited to lecture and give workshops at major universities and cultural institutions internationally. He served as the first Mentor in Dance in the inaugural cycle of the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative and currently co-directs and teaches in the Dance Apprentice Network Across Europe (D.A.N.C.E.) program. Forsythe has been awarded an honorary fellowship from the Laban Centre in London and an honorary doctorate from the Juilliard School in New York.
Awards
He has been chosen as Choreographer Of The Year several times by the international critics’ survey. Forsythe’s choreography and his companies’ performances have won:
- The Bessies (1988, 1998, 2004)
- Laurence Olivier Award (1992, 1999),
- Commandeur des Arts et Lettres (1999)
- the German Distinguished Service Cross (1997)
- the Wexner Prize (2002).
- Dance Magazine Award (2003)
External links
- The Forsythe Company
- William Forsythe: 50 Choreographers of Contemporary Dance. Goethe-Instituts Website
- Ballet Magazine interview with William Forsythe
- Nederlands Dans Theater Biography on William Forsythe
- "I can dance again", Sylvia Staude interviews Frankfurt-based choreographer William Forsythe, Sign and Sight dated 21/04/2005 accessed 22 June 2007
