For its 15th year, Bruce Wood Dance is gifting itself a new name. The contemporary dance company, which is a new iteration of the original founded in Fort Worth by Wood in 1996, has officially rebranded as Bruce Wood Dance Dallas. This is not meant to drive a wedge between the two North Texas cities, but instead broadcast a sense of place as the troupe continues to tour and bring in big-name guest talent from around the globe.
The new name is already enticing admirers, as is evidenced by its stacked 2024-25 season. The former artistic director of Nederlands Dans Theater, Jirí Kylián, has licensed a significant work to BWDD for the first production, Touch, running Nov. 15-17, 2024, at Moody Performance Hall.
Bollinger recalls that Wood once sat his Fort Worth company down and had them watch a recording of Kylián’s Black and White Ballets—a rarity, she says, because Wood didn’t often direct his dancers toward another choreographer’s style.
Kylián’s Lieder Eines Fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a Wayfarer) is on the bill for Touch, along with a duet from Lar Lubovitch’s Dvorak Serenade, Wood’s Piazzolla de Prisa, and a perennial audience favorite of Wood’s, RED.
New works for the New Year are presented in WOOD/SHOP, “the best buffet you can go to,” laughs Bollinger. Hosted Feb. 21-23, 2025, at the Bruce Wood Dance Gallery in the Dallas Design District, the showcase debuts new works choreographed by BWDD company members.
“Throughout the season, we get to see them onstage in their dancer performance capacity, but these artists have such a kaleidoscope of talent, and this series really highlights all their abilities,” Bollinger says. She muses that creating these premieres deepens the bond between the dancers, who not only understand choreography from “inside” the piece but also overall, as a greater purpose of storytelling. “How well they work together shows a true investment in respecting each other as artists and wanting to grow as a whole,” she says.
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Bruce Wood Dance Dallas in I'm My Brother's Keeper, choreography by Bruce Wood. Photo by Brian Guilliaux.
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Bruce Wood Dance Dallas dancer Elliott Trahan. Photo by Kent Barker.
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Alex Brown and Stephanie Godsave in the Duet from Dvorak Serenade, choreography by Lar Lubovitch. Photo by Sharen Bradford.
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Bruce Wood Dance Dallas in Concerto Six Twenty-Two, choreography by Lar Lubovitch. Photo by Sharen Bradford.
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Bruce Wood Dance Dallas dancers Kevyn Brown and Weaver Rhodes. Photo by Kent Barker.
A partnership with choral music group Verdigris Ensemble has been on Bollinger’s wish list for years, and SHAMS, running May 23-25, 2025, at Moody Performance Hall, seemed the ideal opportunity to collaborate. Drawing inspiration from the poetry of Rumi, translated by Zara Houshmand, the production intertwines choral performance, music composed by Sahba Aminikia, video projection, and contemporary dance choreographed by Bollinger to create a multi–sensory experience.
“[Verdigris artistic director] Sam Brukhman prioritizes innovation, new concepts, and exploration of what can be and is unknown,” says Bollinger. “It can be convenient for arts organizations to stick with what they are comfortable and that they know sells, but he refuses to stay there. That’s brave and bold and a real gift.”
Closing the season is Echoes, which includes the highly anticipated return of Wood’s all–male, multigenerational work I’m My Brother’s Keeper and a reprise of Lubovitch’s Concerto Six Twenty–Two. The third piece is the world-premiere Love Songs, choreographed by Kimi Nikaidoh, Nycole Ray, and Jennifer Mabus. Nikaidoh is BWDD’s former artistic director; Ray is the artistic director of Dallas Black Dance Theatre’s professional training company, DBDT: Encore!; and Mabus is a former Battleworks Dance Company member and Bruce Wood Dance Project dancer and rehearsal assistant. Each enjoyed a meaningful and close relationship with Wood, personally as well as professionally, and their creations will translate that deep respect into movement.
—LINDSEY WILSON
