Danielle Russo

As an educator, Danielle Russo (she/her) is faculty at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, CUNY Queens College, SUNY Purchase College, and The Joffrey School where she teaches movement modalities and choreography for site-specific dance and immersive dance theater, as well as lectures on dance history and critical theory with an emphasis on art activism. She has also taught numerous workshops at international institutions and festivals in Europe, and North and Central Americas.  

As a choreographer, Russo has been presented nationally at the American Dance Festival, Detroit Institute of Arts, Jacob’s Pillow, and The Yard; and internationally in Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Mexico, Panama, South Korea, Spain, and Sweden. Residency and fellowship awards have included C.N.N. – Ballet de Lorraine (France), Danscentrum Jette (Belgium), Nadine Laboratory for the Contemporary Arts (Belgium), Independent Artists Initiative WUK (Austria), Jonah Bokaer Arts Foundation, LEIMAY, Mana Contemporary, Performing Arts Forum, and Springboard Danse Montréal (Canada), among others. Local highlights have included Armory Arts Week, Brooklyn Historical Society, Julian Schnabel’s Casa del Popolo, Domino Park, Governors Island, HERE Arts Center, The High Line Nine, La MaMa, Lincoln Center, and Moynihan Station, to name a few. In 2016, her commission for the Los Angeles-based No)one. Art House caught the attention of Solange Knowles and prompted a reprisal of the evening-length work with Knowles’s affiliate arts organization, Saint Heron. Most recently, she was commissioned by The Metropolitan Opera’s Dancers, Chorus, and Orchestra for Open Culture NYC, New York Choral Society, and Climate Week NYC in 2021. Russo is a multi-year grant recipient of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs through the Brooklyn Arts Council, Carnegie Corporation, Dance/NYC, Harkness Foundation for Dance, One Brooklyn Fund, and the Foundation for Contemporary Arts.  

In 2011, she founded Danielle Russo Performance, a co-operative of diverse artists who design interdisciplinary performances for non-traditional “stages”. At home in Brooklyn, DRPP primarily occupies public spaces—architectural, historical, and politically-charged environs—using performance and experiential technology as mechanisms for mutual storytelling and social activism, alike. Its mission is to provoke critical, socially conscious dialogue between artists and the general public by providing open performances, creative workshops, and interactive programming.  

Russo is a recipient of a BFA in Dance and a BA in Anthropology from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, and an MFA in Dance from Hollins University/American Dance Festival where she attended on fellowship. Outside of her own choreographic and teaching practices, she has performed several seasons with The Metropolitan Opera.