When Hope Boykin appeared on the cover of Dance Magazine in 2023, it was a longtime dream fulfilled.
But it played out a bit differently than the choreographer, who for 20 years was one of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s most recognizable performers, had long imagined. In her cover photo, rather than dancing, she sits on a stool as if at the front of the studio. The image seems to assert that a new phase of her life had begun—that, now, she was a choreographer with a capital “C.”
The moment reflected the sometimes-beautiful and sometimes-difficult identity shift Boykin had been undergoing, from a dancer who occasionally choreographed to a full-time choreographer. “I retired from doing what other people say, and I full-time point my finger,” she jokes.
For dancers, the transition to choreography after a lifetime of dancing involves more than just hanging up their (sometimes-proverbial) shoes. It can come with a new perspective on movement, a new relationship to their bodies, and a new way of making dances. And what that shift looks like can vary widely from artist to artist.
A New Identity
When Sidra Bell started choreographing full-time for her company after years of dancing in her own and others’ works, she found herself fielding a lot of questions about what, exactly, she was doing. “You’re not visible onstage, so I felt like I needed to assert what I do,” she says. “Over the years, I was able to make that more legible for audience members who are like, ‘Aren’t you going to be onstage?’ I am onstage. This is all of me—more of me, in some ways.”
Laying down the “dancer” title to focus on making work comes with an internal identity shift to navigate, too—though Caili Quan, a former BalletX dancer and contemporary ballet choreographer, says it was made easier by the fact that movement was a big part of her choreographic practice. “It was tricky taking that [dancer] hat off after I’d been wearing it for decades,” she says. “But I think the great part about making dances is that you’re still inside of your body, so I still get to move in space. I still feel very physical whenever I make a work. I get the best of both.”
The Physical Connection
Without dancing for hours every day, the feeling of being “inside of your body” that Quan references isn’t necessarily a given for choreographers. That was a lesson that Bell had to learn: “There was a period when my body felt disenfranchised due to all the traveling, and the lack of time I was carving out for myself, and the necessity of doing all the administrative work and taking care of the dancers,” she says. “I felt sedentary in my energy. I’ve had to be more conscientious about carving out more self-care and attention to nourishment and energy. You have to choose to be in a certain relationship to your body.”
For Bell, that’s looked like offloading some of her administrative responsibilities, prioritizing sleep, and maintaining a physical practice, which might include Pilates, Gyrotonic, or stationary biking, depending on the day. For Quan, hot yoga, taking as many ballet classes as she has time for, and improvising help her maintain a connection to her body.
Communicating With the Body
Unsurprisingly, dancers who choreograph are often big demonstrators, discovering what they want through their own bodies. But sometimes that changes when those artists stop performing—whether due to a new way of approaching the creative process or because they can no longer execute the movement they imagine in their mind.
“When I was both dancing and choreographing, I wanted to show everything because I wanted to feel everything first,” says Quan. “I was like, ‘This feels good on me, so I think it’ll feel good on them.’ ” Now, Quan typically throws out a “rough draft” of movement and watches how the dancer digests it. How much she’s actually dancing depends on the style she’s working with. “If it’s more classical, my body can’t demonstrate something like that anymore,” she says. “But I did Guys and Dolls for Opera Saratoga, and I found myself doing that full-out, all the time.”
Bell is extremely intentional about whether she’s dancing, depending on the purpose of the rehearsal. For example, ahead of her company’s premiere at Gibney earlier this year, she had multiple residencies. During the first one, she improvised and moved with her dancers, but in the second one, she chose not to. “I focused on the sound and the projections,” she says. “I told the dancers, ‘I’m not giving you a warm-up, because I can’t split my brain like that—if I’m gonna dance with you, I have to be fully there.’ ”
Making Words Work
Bell found that as she transitioned to full-time dancemaking, words became more central to her process. “I became much more specific, and started to learn how to be more incisive with my language,” she says. “It allowed me to tighten the lens.”
When she first retired from dancing, Boykin wouldn’t go anywhere without an assistant, unsure of her own ability to articulate what she wanted through her body or her language as a result of injury, feeling older, and time off during the pandemic. Now, Boykin can verbally communicate what she’s looking for with confidence. “I love having to say out of my mouth what I want,” she says. “And know that my words work.”
Embracing Fluidity
After years away from the stage, Bell recently started dancing again, performing in a series of collaborations with the sound artist Sita Chay. “That’s been really liberating for me,” she says. “It’s on my own terms.”
Bell appreciates that it’s becoming more common for dancers to start choreographing earlier in their careers, and that the categories of “dancer” and “choreographer” have somewhat collapsed. “I think there’s a paradigmatic shift happening now, where things are more fluid,” she says. “There’s more softness around dancing for much longer, and you can leave and return. I love that fluidity—I think it can create a more sustainable model for young artists to know that it doesn’t have to be so fixed in these categories.”
Making the Leap
Dancers who think dancemaking might be their next venture can set themselves up for success during their performing careers. Being a performer, for example, often means having a front-row seat to other choreographers’ creative processes, which can help you figure out what kind of environment you want (or don’t want) to foster when you’re the one at the front of the room.
Caili Quan, a former BalletX dancer and now an in-demand contemporary ballet choreographer, recommends making your ambitions known early and often. “A big part of me becoming a full-time choreographer was sharing my dreams with the people around me as a dancer,” she says. “Share that you want to make work, and you never know the opportunities that will come forward.”
Hope Boykin, who became a full-time choreographer in 2020 after retiring from Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, where she had already been making work, agrees. “Don’t wait until one thing is over and then start the other thing,” she says. “You have to start before the start date.”
