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Emily Johnson
Emily Johnson
Emily Johnson
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Emily Johnson (born March 19, 1976, in Soldotna, Alaska)[1] is an American dancer,[2] writer, and choreographer of Yup'ik descent.[3][4] She grew up in Sterling, Alaska, and is based in New York City.[5] She is artistic director of her performance company, Emily Johnson/Catalyst. Johnson is a organizer for the First Nations Dialogues New York/Lenapehoking.[6] She has worked part-time at Birchbark Books, an independent bookstore owned by author Louise Erdrich.[3][4]

Key Information

Performative, administrative and choreographic work

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Johnson has danced for Minneapolis-based choreographers Morgan Thorson, Hijack, and BodyCartography Project,[2] and collaborated with New York-based playwright/ director Lisa D'Amour and music ensemble So Percussion, as well as Korean visual artist Minouk Lim.

In 1998 Johnson founded a dance company, Catalyst, in Minneapolis, after graduating from the University of Minnesota with a degree in dance. Since then, she has created 22 original performance pieces, as well as several collaborative projects with other artists, including SHORE, the third part of a trilogy of works that began with The Thank-you Bar (2009) and Niicugni (2012), and which was performed on tour through 2015.[7] She has been central in organizing the Indigenous gathering Knowledge of Wounds starting in 2017.[8]

Choreographic style

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Johnson states that she began dance as a response to the grief of a close friend dying.[9]

Johnson's dances "...often function as installations", and her choreography "...considers the experience of sensing and seeing performance."[10] In a presentation at the University of Minnesota in 2014, she talked about her choreographic practice as dance responding to the world.[11]

Dance and community

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One distinguishing characteristic of Johnson's work is community involvement in particular located places.[12] Among the motivating concerns for The thank you bar (trilogy part 1) were community and tribal responses to displacement.[13] In Vermont,[14] Minnesota,[15] Alaska, California, and Arizona,[16] she invited members of the community to sew fish skin together to form lanterns. These lantern were subsequently hung, with lights and speakers inside, to illuminate halls where Niicugni (trilogy part 2) was performed.[16] Shore (trilogy part 3) included community feasting.[17] Johnson organized a recent work, Then a cunning voice and a night we spend gazing at stars, with community quiltmaking workshops. The quilts became part of the set for the dance performance.[7][9]

This community involvement in dance echoes other dance forms, which are often less formal and outside of the usual definition of "contemporary" dance, such as participatory dance Participation Dance and ceremonial dance Ceremonial Dance. Johnson's oeuvre may be seen as a bridge between community and cultural contexts, on the one hand, and the world of contemporary artistry, on the other hand. As Vermont Performance Lab director Sara Coffey observes, there may be a tension between artistic vision and openness to community: "I think it's very brave in the contemporary dance world to let all these others into your work... You don't always have control of what that's going to be. I think Emily, as an artist, wants a place to rub off on her work as much as she wants to rub off on the place where she's performing".[12] Johnson attempts to resolve this tension through dynamism, described in the Anchorage Museum's Polar Lab blog as using "dance as a framework for constant transformation that refuses to stabilize, intervention immediately opens up for exchange, conversation and partnership" (anonymous account,[18]).

Awards

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Emily Johnson / Catalyst was awarded a 2012 Outstanding Production ("new art, dance and performance") Bessie Award[19] for The Thank-you Bar, created and performed by Johnson with collaborators James Everest and Joel Pickard.

  • Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, 2014
  • Robert Rauschenberg Foundation Residency, 2014
  • McKnight Foundation Artist Fellowship for Choreographers, 2013
  • Creative Capital Award, 2013
  • Joyce Foundation Fellowship, 2013
  • The Doris Duke Residency to Build Demand for the Arts, 2013
  • Map Fund, lead artist, 2013
  • NPN Creation Fund, 2012
  • Map Fund, lead artist, 2012
  • New York Dance and Performance Award (Bessie Award) for Outstanding Production, 2012 (The Thank-you Bar)
  • Sage Award for Outstanding Performance, 2011 (The Thank-you Bar)
  • National Dance Project Production Grant, 2011
  • New England Foundation for the Arts Native Artist Exchange, 2011
  • Artist of the Year, City Pages, 2010
  • Native Arts and Cultures Foundation Artist Fellowship for Dance, 2011
  • MAP Fund, 2010, lead artist
  • Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, Community Fund, 2009
  • National Dance Project Touring Grant, 2009
  • Map Fund, 2009, lead artist
  • Loft, Native InRoads Writing Program, 2009
  • McKnight Foundation Artist Fellowship for Choreographers, 2009
  • Seventh Generation Fund Grant, 2009
  • NPN Creation Fund, 2008
  • Forecast Public Artworks, Research and Development Grant, 2008
  • Smithsonian Institution Expressive Arts Award, with Rhiana Yazzie, 2008
  • The Puffin Foundation, 2005
  • Bush Foundation Artist Fellowship, 2004
  • Jerome Foundation Artist Fellowship 2004, 2003, 2002, 2001
  • Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Fellowship 2001

References

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Emily Johnson

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Emily Johnson is an American choreographer, dancer, and artist of Yup'ik descent known for her body-based performances that integrate movement, community engagement, environmental interaction, and Indigenous-centered futures. She creates works that function as portals and care processions, engaging audiences through space, time, architecture, history, and collective action while emphasizing connection to land, stories, and justice. Raised in Sterling, Alaska, on Dena’ina land, Johnson began her dance career after studying at the University of Minnesota, where she graduated in 1998 and soon founded her performance company, Emily Johnson/Catalyst. She relocated to New York City in 2014 and has since become a prominent voice in advancing decolonization practices within the arts, including land acknowledgments and equity guidelines for presenting institutions. Her activism extends to land and water protection efforts, notably organizing to defend green spaces in New York City. Johnson's acclaimed projects often blur boundaries between performance, daily life, and social change, incorporating elements such as communal feasts, quilting, storytelling, and direct action. Among her notable works are the Bessie Award-winning The Thank-you Bar, the all-night outdoor gathering Then a Cunning Voice and A Night We Spend Gazing at Stars, and the ongoing Being Future Being. She has also served as choreographer for the Santa Fe Opera's production of Doctor Atomic. Her contributions have been recognized with major honors, including a Bessie Award for choreography, Guggenheim Fellowship, United States Artists Fellowship, Doris Duke Artist Award, and support from the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation.

Early life

Birth and background

Emily Johnson was born on March 19, 1976, in Soldotna, Alaska. She grew up in Sterling. She is of Yup'ik descent on her father's side, from the Yukon/Kuskokwim Delta (Bethel and Akiak specifically).

Career

Early career and founding of Catalyst

Emily Johnson graduated from the University of Minnesota with a degree in dance in 1998 and founded her performance company, Catalyst (later Emily Johnson/Catalyst), in Minneapolis that year. She began creating body-based performances focusing on endurance, climate change, and Indigenous-centered futures, collaborating with local artists and building the foundation for her later work.

Relocation and major projects

Johnson relocated to New York City in 2014. Her notable works include The Thank-you Bar (premiered 2009–2011 period, Bessie Award winner), the first part of a trilogy continued with Niicugni (2012) and SHORE (2014). Then a Cunning Voice and A Night We Spend Gazing at Stars premiered in 2017 in New York City as an all-night outdoor gathering with community-made quilts, dance, storytelling, and feasting; it later toured to Chicago in 2019. Being Future Being, an ongoing project emphasizing radically just, Indigenized futures and community processes, premiered in 2022 in Los Angeles. She choreographed the Santa Fe Opera's production of Doctor Atomic in 2018, directed by Peter Sellars. Johnson's career integrates performance with activism, including land and water protection efforts and decolonization practices in the arts, such as co-compiling equity guidelines and organizing Indigenous dialogues. Her work blurs boundaries between art, daily life, and social change through communal elements like quilting, feasts, and direct action.

Personal life

Relationships

Emily Johnson was previously married to James Everest, a musician who has served as musical director for her company, Catalyst, since 2003. She later became single and began steps toward in vitro fertilization in 2016. She is currently partnered with artist IV Castellanos. The couple has a child born in 2023.
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