Over 80% of Ballets Are Still Choreographed By Men

By Lauren Wingenwroth

25 July 2019

In the past several years, ballet has been called out time and again for not fostering, presenting and commissioning the work of women. Recently, highlighting women ballet choreographers has become somewhat of a trend, with companies pioneering initiatives to try to close the gender gap, or presenting all-women programs.

But numbers don’t lie, and unfortunately, we still haven’t made much progress.

A new report released by the Dance Data Project—a nonprofit launched earlier this yearto assess gender inequity in ballet—looks at the 2018-2019 seasons of America’s 50 largest balletcompanies (this list is determined by budget, and “ballet” is defined loosely: The list includes companies like Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and L.A. Dance Project).Here are the biggest takeaways:

81 percent of works last season were choreographed by men.

That’s 520 of the total 645 works performed by these companies last season. Looking at just full-length ballets the number grows worse: 88 percent were choreographed by men.

One bright spot: Only 65 percent of world premieres were choreographed by men—but of full-length world premieres, 90 percent were by men. Men choreographed 70 percent of mainstage world premieres, although women did have more opportunities in non-mainstage world premieres, which were split 55 percent men and 45 percent women.

Read the full article on Dance Magazine’s blog.