“A frightening vision of urban apocalypse…Last Look is so engrossing that when the lights go up for curtain calls, one wonders for an instant where these nine smiling young humanoids came from.”
– Martha Duffy, Time

Paul Taylor was born in 1930 and grew up in and around Washington, DC. He was a swimmer and student of painting at Syracuse University in the late 1940s until he discovered dance, which he began studying at Juilliard. By 1954 he had assembled a small company of dancers and was making his own works. He joined the Martha Graham Dance Company in 1955 for the first of seven seasons as soloist while continuing to choreograph on his own troupe. In 1959 he danced with New York City Ballet as a guest artist. After retiring as a performer in 1974, Mr. Taylor devoted himself fully to choreography and masterpieces continued to pour forth. Since 1968, when Aureole first entered the repertoire of the Royal Danish Ballet, his works have been licensed for performance by more than 75 companies worldwide.

In celebration of the Paul Taylor Dance Company’s 50th Anniversary in 2004-05, his works were performed in all 50 States. Mr. Taylor has received every important honor given to artists in the United States. Dancemaker, Matthew Diamond’s award-winning, Oscar-nominated feature-length film about Mr. Taylor, was hailed by Time as “perhaps the best dance documentary ever.”

Under the Artistic Direction of Lawrence Rhodes, Juilliard Dance aims to create true contemporary dancers – trained equally in classical ballet and modern dance. Established in 1951 by William Schuman during his tenure as president of Juilliard, with the guidance of founding director Martha Hill, Juilliard Dance became the first major teaching institution to combine equal dance instruction in both contemporary and ballet techniques.

Each year The Juilliard School accepts 24 dancers to the four-year B.F.A. program. Recent commissions include works by Aszure Barton, Robert Battle, Ronald K. Brown, Eliot Feld, Larry Keigwin, and Susan Marshall. Spring performances give dancers the opportunity to perform in established works from contemporary repertory. Recent repertory performances included works by William Forsythe, Martha Graham, Jirí Kylián, Paul Taylor, and Antony Tudor.

Juilliard Dance alumni include, among many others, the choreographers and directors Pina Bausch, Lar Lubovitch, Ohad Naharin, and Paul Taylor.