Elizabeth Lerman

Liz Lerman is a choreographer, writer, educator, and speaker, and the recipient of honors including a 2023 Guggenheim Fellowship, 2002 MacArthur “Genius Grant,” and a 2017 Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award. Key to her artistry is opening her process to various publics, resulting in research and outcomes that are multi-disciplinary, participatory, urgent, and funny. 

Liz founded and led Dance Exchange from 1976 until 2011. She is the author of several books including Teaching Dance to Senior Adults, Hiking the Horizontal, and Critique is Creative (co-authored by John Borstel), which addresses the Critical Response Process: a communication system for giving and receiving feedback that she invented decades ago. 

Current projects include building the Atlas of Creative Tools, an online resource, and Legacy Unboxed, which includes a series of research performance events called My Body is a Library. Also coming soon is a collection of essays to be published by Wesleyan University Press. 

Liz is an Institute Professor at the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts at Arizona State University. A former fellow of the Robert W. Deutsch Foundation, Liz is currently a fellow at the Center for the Study of Race and Democracy at Arizona State University.