Danielle Diniz

We are excited to announce the recipient of this year’s NEXT commission, Danielle Diniz.

Danielle’s piece (title to be announced) explores her Latina heritage and the immigrant experience through the lens of family history: her grandparents coming to America from Mexico and Portugal respectively, often under trying circumstances, escaping even more difficult lives. Her piece will not only focus on the struggles and triumphs of these new Americans, but will incorporate disparate elements of Latin culture, music, and dance in a true stylistic “melting pot” that mirrors, more broadly, the hopes and dreams of our collective American experience.

Themes such as family, work, death and grief, and celebration will be explored and amplified through Portuguese Fado, Mexican Dia de los Muertos iconography and Mariachi guitars, pizzicato, and Nuevo Flamenco. Ballet will be intertwined with elements of mambo, tango, salsa and other Latin dances to showcase a multitude of worlds, and convey a theme of sacred remembrance — who and what came before us and what will be: a progression of our newest citizens, and ultimately, of all people.

Danielle Diniz Bio

Ms. Diniz recently completed her time as Artist in Residence at Tribeca BMCC via CUNY Dance Initiative for the 2023 season, fully choreographing and directing her own evening of repertory, and became Co Artistic Director of Jazz Choreography Enterprises at the start of 2024. She choreographed for the Ailey BFA program and New York Dance Project this past fall, made new works for St. Paul's ballet program and Counterpointe this winter and will make a piece for Ballet Hartford in the spring.

She has been commissioned by Jacob's Pillow, Performance Santa Fe, Avant Chamber Ballet, Columbia Ballet Collaborative, Stars of American Ballet, Ballet Hartford, Woman in Motion, Ballet Excel Ohio, Central Utah Ballet, Earl Mosley's Diversity of Dance and the Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning.

She was a featured choreographer for DanceBreak (musical theater's leading platform for upcoming Broadway choreographers), made her Off-Broadway choreographic debut at the AMT Theatre with 'An Unbalanced Mind,' presented work at the McCallum Theatre/Palm Desert Choreography Festival and the New York Theatre Barn Choreography Lab held at Baryshnikov Arts Center and was awarded a grant from the New York Foundation for the Arts/City Artist Corps to present a full evening of her choreography.

She is a winner of the New York Dance Project Choreography Competition, a junior board member of Jazz Choreography Enterprises and a choreographic mentor for We Are Queens. She also choreographed 'My Way' at Theatre by the Sea, the AEA production of the Vaudevillian musical 'On the Air,' currently choreographs and assistant directs intermittent musical theater showcases at The American Musical and Dramatic Academy and has served as Associate Choreographer for Lorin Latarro.

She is on faculty at Kanyok Arts Initiative and Manhattan Youth Ballet and also enjoys teaching for Steps on Broadway, Mark Morris and Peridance.

Ms. Diniz has a B.A. in English (concentration in Shakespearean Studies, minor in Dance) from Cornell University.