President Damian Woetzel to Honor Jacqulyn Buglisi with President’s Medal on August 31 at Juilliard’s 2022 Convocation

Monday, Aug 29, 2022
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CONTACTS:
Rosalie Contreras
Rachelle Roe
[email protected]
 

August 29, 2022

 

President Damian Woetzel to Honor Jacqulyn Buglisi With President’s Medal

on August 31 at Juilliard’s 2022 Convocation

 

Dancer and choreographer Jacqulyn Buglisi is the founder of Buglisi Dance Theatre

and Table of Silence Project 9/11

NEW YORK –– Juilliard President Damian Woetzel will present renowned choreographer Jacqulyn Buglisi with the President’s Medal on Wednesday, August 31, 2022, at 4pm, during the school’s annual convocation, which inaugurates the new school year for Juilliard students, faculty, staff, and trustees. The event will be livestreamed to the public at the Juilliard website at Juilliard.edu.

Jacqulyn Buglisi’s creative work embodies the power of the modern form and brings to life testaments to the essence of humanity in our era,” Woetze said. “Her leadership and vision in creating the Table of Silence Project 9/11 is a shining model of citizen artistry for our students and for all of us.”

In her four-decade-long career, Jacqulyn Buglisi has made an indelible impact on dance and the performing arts as a dancer, choreographer, artistic director, producer, advocate, and pedagogue. As a principal dancer in the Martha Graham Dance Company for 12 years, this formative connection to the foundations of modern dance has served as a cornerstone for her own powerful choreographic repertoire. Creating works that implement multiple visual, musical, and physical elements as well as use literature, history, and heroic archetypes as inspiration, Buglisi’s collaborations with major artists have served as prime examples of interdisciplinary practice. Her commitment to education has been constant throughout her career, including as chairperson and faculty of the modern department at the Ailey School since 1988, as faculty at Juilliard from 1991 to 2005, and at the Martha Graham School since 1977.

Buglisi conceived and choreographed the Table of Silence Project 9/11, a free public performance ritual for peace performed annually at Lincoln Center, initially to memorialize those lost on September 11, 2001, and it continues to grow as healing ritual, relevant to the present-day issues facing humanity. “Over the past 12 years, the Table of Silence Project has evolved to mean more than September 11 as we harness the global power of collective breath in pursuit of peace and reflection. The need for peace is never finished for humanity. The sense of urgency for this call to action has only grown more vital since the project’s inception,” Buglisi said.

Hundreds of Juilliard students, faculty, and alumni have participated in the Table of Silence Project since its first performance, in 2011. Woetzel remarked that the project is “an artistic revelation, combining the influences of meditation and ritual to transcend earthly divisions and project the promise of uniting humanity.”

In anticipation of receiving the President’s Medal, Buglisi said, “I am deeply moved and honored to receive this beautiful recognition. I’m remembering all those unforgettable moments with the dancers in the initial journey to create the performance ritual at Lincoln Center. Juilliard truly is an inspirational and essential campus partner—from the heart of my heart I thank you.”

The Table of Silence Project 9/11 takes place this year on the Josie Robertson Plaza at Lincoln Center at 8am on September 11 and will be livestreamed. Artistic collaborators include the Buglisi Dance Theatre co-founder/principal dancer Terese Capucilli (faculty 1999-present), Italian visual artist Rossella Vasta, coach/flutist John Ragusa, trumpeter Pamela Fleming, composer/percussionist Paula Jeanine Bennett, and film/livestream producer Nel Shelby and Nel Shelby Productions. Table of Silence Project 9/11 is achieved through community partnerships with Juilliard, Dance/NYC, Chelsea Factory, Gibney Dance Center, Martha Graham Center, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, and Steps on Broadway, among others.

The Juilliard President’s Medal was established in 2005 to honor individuals who have made an indelible impact on society and serve as significant role models at Juilliard and in the broader community. The medal itself was created by renowned graphic designer Milton Glaser. Buglisi’s is among the initial medals given by President Damian Woetzel, whose first awardee, in 2020, was the iconic civil rights leader and former Juilliard clarinet student Clarence B. Jones.

About Jacqulyn Buglisi

Jacqulyn Buglisi,artistic director and choreographer of Buglisi Dance Theatre, formerly Buglisi/Foreman Dance, is a prolific choreographer, having created more than 100 ballets. During her time as a Juilliard faculty member, Buglisi choreographed her masterworks Requiem and Suspended Women and was commissioned to choreograph Splendor with composer Daniel Brewbaker for the innovative program New Dances at Juilliard. She was also honored to be in conversation with Benjamin Harkarvy (faculty 1990-2002) for the school’s Emerging Modern Masters series with her company.

Buglisi is commissioned worldwide including Suspended Women on the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre (premiere: New York City Center and the David H. Koch Theater); Ninfee for the Richmond Ballet; her full-length The Four Elements for the Flamenco Festival presented in Madrid, Sadler’s Wells, London, and New York’s City Center; the Joyce Theater; Prague International Dance Festival; Ananda Shankar Performing Arts Company, India; the Shanghai Song and Dance Ensemble, China; the Martha Graham Dance Company, North Carolina Dance Theatre, Joyce Trisler Danscompany, Teatro Danza Contemporanea di Roma, of which she was a co-founder, in 1969; American Repertory Ballet; Ailey II;  and Ice Theatre of New York.

Her “bewilderingly beautiful” ballet Threshold had its Italian premiere in Milan with Carla Fracci's Italian Ballet Company at the Teatro Nuovo and at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Opera House. Buglisi, with Foreman, premiered their full-length ballet Runes of the Heart at Lincoln Center in 1994, followed by invitations to the Kennedy Center, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, and the Joyce Theater, where Buglisi Dance Theatre performs its NYC seasons. In 2001, she created Requiem to the soaring music of Gabriel Fauré, a transcendent experience and amplification of the human spirit. Anna Kisselgoff raves in The New York Times of the ballet’s powerful images, stunning ... extravagant and beautiful. Breaking new ground, Buglisi collaborated with Venezuela’s leading environmental artist Jacobo Borges to create her trilogy Blue Cathedral, Rain, and Sand.

Buglisi’s recent artistic innovations include the Moss Anthology, a timely work on climate change and the survival of humanity on our planet, and the Threads Project #1 “Universal Dialogues” featuring collaborations with diverse contemporary choreographers and inspiration from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and poets/writers Rilke, Sandra Cisneros, and Laylee Long Solider.

She has collaborated with composers Jeff Beal, Tan Dun, Glen Velez, Jennifer Higdon, Daniel Bernard Roumain (DBR), Libby Larsen, Daniel Brewbaker, Reza Vali; Andy Teirstein; cellist Maya Beiser; Flamenco guitarist Gerardo Nunez, the Cassatt String Quartet, the Syracuse University Symphony Orchestra and Singers; spoken-word artist Marc Bamuthi Joseph; lighting designers Clifton Taylor and Jack Mehler; mannequin maker Ralph Pucci; and Italian artist Rossella Vasta on the Table of Silence Project 9/11, a site-specific ritual for peace performed at Lincoln Center by 180 dancers and nine musicians, and seen via livestream across the U.S. in 50 states and 235 countries and territories. For her contribution in uniting the dance community through the Table of Silence, Buglisi was named a “New Yorker for Dance” by Dance/NYC and received proclamations from Governor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio.

During her 30-year association with the Martha Graham Dance Company, Buglisi was a principal dancer for 12 years, performing the classic roles and those created for her by Graham. She danced in Graham’s honor on the nationally televised CBS Presentation of the Kennedy Center Honors and the PBS film An Evening of Dance and Conversation With Martha Graham. Buglisi’s duet Sospiri was performed by the Martha Graham Company at New York City Center (1989). Coached by Jane Sherman, she performed Ruth St. Denis’ solos internationally including Lyon Biennale De La Danse and on film in Trailblazers of American Modern Dance and The Spirit of Denishawn.        

A master teacher committed to arts-in-education, Buglisi has received commissions from the University of Richmond, California State University/Long Beach, George Mason University, SUNY Purchase Conservatory of Dance, Interlochen Arts Academy, Florida State University at Tallahassee, the State Ballet College of Oslo, Ailey/Fordham University B.F.A. Program, Oklahoma Arts Institute, Juilliard’s Emerging Modern Masters series, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, Boston Conservatory of Music, Randolph-Macon College, the National Dance Institute, and New World School of the Arts, among others. In 1970, she founded the first school of contemporary dance for the community of Spoleto, Italy, and was the master artist-in-residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts. She has taught for the Dance Aspen Festival (1990-95), the Julio Bocca Center in Argentina, the 97-98 Victoria College Melbourne, and the Chautauqua Institution and Festival. She has served as chairperson and faculty member of the modern department at the Ailey School for 25 years, on the Juilliard faculty from 1991 to 2005, the Martha Graham School since 1977, and guest teaches at the famed Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School for Music & Art and the Performing Arts (of which she’s also an alumna), Steps on Broadway, and Peridance Capezio Center. She was named honorary chair for the Marymount Manhattan College ‘05 gala and served as panelist for the Heinz Awards and the New Jersey State Council for the Arts. She served as a grand marshal of the 2013 dance parade in New York City.

Buglisi’s repertoire is archived in the Jerome Robbins Dance Collection of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Awards, and her honors include: Bessies awards 2020 Special Citation Honoree for the Table of Silence Project, 2016 Fini Italian International Lifetime Achievement Award, 2014 Kaatsbaan International Playing Field Award, American Dance Guild Award for Artistic Excellence, Fiorello LaGuardia Award for Excellence, the Gertrude Shurr Award for Dance, Altria Group’s 2007 Women Choreographer Initiative Award, National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, commissioning grants from the Harkness Foundation for Dance and the O’Donnell-Green Music and Dance Foundation, and challenge grants from the Arnhold Foundation, among others. She served for three terms on Dance/USA’s board of trustees as chair of the artistic directors Council (2010-13). Buglisi has been featured on the cover of Dance Teacher magazine; in articles for Dance Spirit and Dance magazines; and in an Arts & Leisure feature in The New York Times.

About The Juilliard School

Founded in 1905, The Juilliard School is a world leader in performing arts education. The school’s mission is to provide the highest caliber of artistic education for gifted musicians, dancers, and actors, composers, choreographers, and playwrights from around the world so that they may achieve their fullest potential as artists, leaders, and global citizens. Juilliard is guided in all its work by the core values of excellence; creativity; and equity, diversity, inclusion, and belonging (EDIB). 

Located at Lincoln Center in New York City, Juilliard offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in dance, drama (acting and playwriting), and music (classical, jazz, historical performance, and vocal arts). Currently more than 800 artists from 43 states and 44 countries and regions are enrolled in Juilliard’s College Division, where they appear in more than 700 annual performances in the school’s five theaters; at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully and David Geffen halls and at Carnegie Hall; as well as at other venues around New York City, the country, and the world. The continuum of learning at Juilliard also includes nearly 400 students from elementary through high school enrolled in the Preparatory Division, including its Music Advancement Program (MAP), which serves students from diverse backgrounds often underrepresented in the classical music field. More than 800 students are enrolled in Juilliard Extension, the flagship continuing education program taught both in person and remotely by a dedicated faculty of performers, creators, and scholars. Beyond its New York campus, Juilliard is defining new directions in performing arts education for a range of learners and enthusiasts through a global K-12 educational curricula and graduate studies at The Tianjin Juilliard School in China.

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