Ellen Oliver

Ellen Oliver (she/they) is an interdisciplinary dancer and digital media artist from Blackstone, MA. Her research explores the intersection of rock climbing and dance through technology, installation, sculpture, and performance. She studied dance at UNC School of the Arts, holds a BA from Hampshire College, and received an MFA in Dance (Choreography) from the University of Iowa. Ellen has collaborated frequently with artists such as Angela Cole, David Hurlin, Dayita Nereyeth, and Ramin Roshandel. Most recently, Ellen’s collaborative work has been performed in a live OptiTrack motion capture studio, a 360 rock climbing piano installation, an empty grain silo, and a 50-foot climbing wall. Her 2024 MFA thesis project, “Route Movements,” was the first dance concert at the University of Iowa’s Motion Capture Studio, in which Ellen worked with a team of artists to use real-time mocap data to animate live avatars through projections, lights, and spatialized sound zones. Ellen’s video animations and live chroma-key installations often feature a green screen climbing wall to hybridize a shared movement language between rock climbing, vertical dance, and live technology. She has performed with companies and projects, including Lorraine Chapman the Company, Todd T. Brown, OceA Wilderness at The Yard, TEN31 Productions/Metamorphosis Dance Company, Fusionworks Dance Company, Kelley Donovan & Dancers, Arc Iris/HDC Dance Ensemble, and Ali Kenner Brodsky & Co. In 2018, Ellen was a “Principal Dancer” for Greta Gerwig’s “Little Women,” choreographed by Monica Bill Barnes. Ellen’s solo and collaborative work has been presented nationally and internationally at venues including Keene State College, the Open Air Media Festival in Iowa City, Shoonya Centre for Arts and Somatic Practices in Bangalore, India, New Work Series NYC,  Iowa’s International Writers Program, Dixon Place, AS200 Providence, F-O-R-M in Vancouver, Canada, Urbanity Dance Company's neXt Residency, and Bearnstow in Maine. Ellen was a 2024 Resident at Omi: Dance in New York and a 2020 White Mountain National Forest Artist in Residence.  www.ellenoliverdance.com

Ellen Oliver is fiscally sponsored by Boston Dance Alliance, Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit tax-exempt organization. Contributions in support of Ellen's work are greatly appreciated and may be made to Boston Dance Alliance, Inc., earmarked for “Ellen Oliver.” All contributions are fully tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.