Canadian choreographer Crystal Pite is the founder and artistic director of the Vancouver-based company Kidd Pivot (2002), a company that strives to distill and translate universal questions into artworks that connect us to essential parts of humanity. World-renowned for radical hybrids of dance and theatre, Kidd Pivot tours internationally with critically acclaimed works such as Betroffenheit, Revisor, and Assembly Hall (co-created with Jonathon Young), The Tempest Replica, Dark Matters, Lost Action, and The You Show.
Crystal Pite began her dance career as a member of Ballet British Columbia (Ballet BC), then of William Forsythe's Ballett Frankfurt and, currently, she is an Associate Artist at the Nederlands Dans Theater, Sadler’s Wells (London) and Canada’s National Arts Centre. In a choreographic career spanning 35 years, Pite has created more than sixty works for for dance companies in Canada and around the world, such as The Royal Ballet, Nederlands Dans Theater, The Paris Opera Ballet, and the National Ballet of Canada. She is known for works that courageously address themes such as trauma, addiction, conflict, consciousness and mortality; her bold and original vision has earned her international acclaim and inspired an entire generation of dance artists.
Pite’s many awards include the 2022 Governor General of Canada’s Performing Arts Award, the 2011 Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award and the Canada Council’s 2012 Jacqueline Lemieux Prize. In 2017, she received the Benois de la Danse for her creation The Seasons’ Canon at the Paris Opera Ballet. In 2018, she received the Grand Prix de la danse de Montréal. She is the recipient of four Sir Laurence Olivier awards for creations with Kidd Pivot and The Royal Ballet.
She holds an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from Simon Fraser University and is a Member of the Order of Canada.
