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Headshot of Daniel Burkholder.

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Daniel Burkholder

  • Associate Professor, Dance
  • Chair, Department of Dance

Education

  • MFA, Dance, UW-Milwaukee
  • MA, Dance, American University
  • BA, Liberal Arts, Sarah Lawrence University

Biography

Daniel Burkholder is a dance artist whose choreographic/improvisational work spans theatrical performances, site-specific events, immersive media, and screendance. Currently projects include Embodied Truth: Finding Ways to Move Together, a collaboration with NYC-based artist Kimani Fowlin, which uses dance, storytelling, and spoken word to explore race and gender through the lens of parenting. Daniel and Kimani have presented workshops, choreographed original performances, and performed in Milwaukee, Cincinnati, at the Dance and Somatic Conference and Performance Festival, in New York City with parents who were formerly incarcerated, and as guest artists at the International Dance Day Festival in Beirut, Lebanon. Daniel is the creator and host of act/re/act, a podcast exploring improvisation across artistic forms through conversations with remarkable artists. Daniel is also the creator of Spontaneous Self, a pedagogical approach to investigate improvisational dance performance, the integration of somatics (specifically The Feldenkrais Method) into dance training, and how Mindfulness practices can enhance and deepen artistic expression.

Daniel has created over 50 dance works that have been presented in theaters, non-traditional venues, in site-specific locations, and on the screen - venues include: Tribeca Performing Arts Center, 92nd Street Y, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Dance Place, along the Anacostia, Potomac and Milwaukee Rivers, Mid-West Regional Area Dance Festival (MI), Lynden Sculpture Garden Gallery (WI), Breaking Ground: Contemporary Dance and Film Festival (AZ), Danceworks Theater (MKE), 848 Community Space (SF), and as part of a week-long residency in Manta, Ecuador. He has taught at numerous festivals and intensives, including West Coast Contact Improvisation Festival, Texas Dance Improvisation Festival, and the Wild Meadows Improvisation Intensive. His work has been commissioned by The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, James Madison University, Goucher College, among others. He was a Resident Artist at the Djerassi Artist Residency (CA), taught as a guest teacher for Cirque du Soleil, and was an artist-in-residence for 5 years at Georgetown University Hospital. He holds degrees from Sarah Lawrence College, American University, and University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, he is also a Guild Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner, a MNDFL Certified Mindfulness Instructor, and a Certified Critical Response Process Fascilitator.

Daniel Burkholder is the Chair of the Department of Dance in the Peck School of the Arts at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee. Previously he served as the Director of the MFA in Dance program for 5 years.

Links

Recent Work

Two dancers balance in an intertwined acrobatic pose under stage lighting against a dark theater background.
Image from “My ocean is never blue”
Person in a white outfit performs a dynamic dance pose under blue stage lighting against a textured orange backdrop.
Image from “Unmapped”
Solo dancer suspended midair above a dark stage, illuminated by warm spotlight against a black background.
Image from “Is This Enough?”
Excerpts from “Stories of a Life”, performed by Danceworks Performance MKE
Excerpts from “Scenic Route: MKE”

Accolades

  • UW-Milwaukee Graduate of the Decade (2018)
  • UW-Milwaukee Faculty Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching Award (2023)

Artistic Works & Performances

  • Pause. Choreographed and performed by Daniel Burkholder and Kimani Fowlin. Commissioned by Composers Concordance. St Marks Church In-the-Bowery, NYC. 2024
  • starting with nothing. Created by Daniel Burkholder in collaboration with composer Brittany Padilla. Texas Dance Improvisation Festival. Women's Texas University. 2023
  • Embodied Truth. Choreographed by Daniel Burkholder and Kimani Fowlin. Commissioned by International Dance Day Festival Lebanon. Beruit, Lebanon. 2023
  • the things that I have lost. Choreographed by Daniel Burkholder. Commissioned by Goucher College. Virtual. 2021