BalletMet Artistic Director Edwaard Liang is accustomed to choreographing movement on stages, but it’s the move he’s about to make that is sure to surprise the central Ohio arts community.
After more than a decade at the helm of the ballet company, Liang will leave the position at the end of the present 2023-24 season, his 11th.
BalletMet announced Tuesday that the 48-year-old arts leader has accepted the position of artistic director at the Washington Ballet in Washington, D.C. His duties in the nation’s capital will commence with the 2024-25 season.
“I am so grateful to Columbus and BalletMet for giving this young choreographer and artistic director a chance,” Liang said in an interview this weekend. “I really grew so much. I wouldn’t be in the position that I’m in as an artist, as a choreographer or as a leader without BalletMet and this community.”
At the Washington Ballet, Liang, a former dancer at the New York City Ballet, will follow in the footsteps of Julie Kent, the legendary ballerina who stepped down from the role of artistic director last season. Liang will join a high-profile company that performs regularly at such venues as John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
“I think Edwaard is so deserving of this new opportunity,” said BalletMet Executive Director Sue Porter. “I’m so excited for him, but I certainly am sad that we’re not all going to see him on a daily basis.”
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When he arrived in Columbus in 2013, Liang had already made waves as a choreographer, but he did not have previous experience leading a ballet company.
Even so, he did not hesitate in boldly transforming BalletMet.
Under his watch, the company’s roster of professional dancers was refreshed through national auditions and new hires — today, only a handful of dancers remain from before Liang’s tenure — and a vibrant “second company” of younger dancers, BalletMet 2, was established. He proudly lists other achievements.
“We’ve doubled the budget, we’ve doubled the size of our trainee program and our academy,” said Liang, who also tapped his network of choreographer peers to bring fresh voices to Columbus, including acclaimed choreographers Gustavo Ramirez Sansano, Justin Peck and Christopher Wheeldon.
“We’ve been able to bring my heroes and artists that I look up to and that are my colleagues to Columbus,” he said.
In a nod to his roots at New York City Ballet, Liang also regularly programmed ballets by legendary choreographers George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins.
Liang challenged his dancers — and sometimes audiences — with his own often boundary-pushing dances, including “The Art of War” and a “water ballet” titled “Airavata.” He also became increasingly recognized for ambitious, large-scale productions, including the “Twisted” collaborations with the Columbus Symphony and Opera Columbus — a multi-organization partnership whose scale was unprecedented in the Columbus arts scene.
His full-length original ballets include “Dorothy and the Prince of Oz,” “Cinderella” and “Romeo and Juliet,” which will end the current season on April 26-28.
“He brought an amazing artistic vision to the organization and, together, the board and all of us here were able to support that vision,” Porter said.
Liang — who with his husband, Columbus City Schools assistant principal John Kuijper, makes his home in German Village — said he was not looking to make a move when the Washington Ballet reached out to him about their artistic director search in January.
“They had heard of some of the great work that we’ve done all together here at BalletMet, and they wanted some advice,” said Liang, who, in the spring, was approached by a firm conducting the search for the Washington Ballet.
“What felt right about it is that, because of my experiences and what I’ve learned and lived through . . . I was now poised for the next step,” he said.
Through next spring, Liang will spend time in both Columbus and Washington, D.C.; he will concurrently oversee the rest of BalletMet’s season and serve as a consultant at the Washington Ballet. He anticipates making a permanent move next summer.
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At BalletMet, Porter said that an international search for a new artistic director will begin “immediately.”
“The hope is that by next summer, we will have identified a new artistic director,” she said. “We certainly are going to be looking for that special artist who can make sure that this community continues to be able to have world-class dance on our stages.”
For his part, Liang is confident that he is moving on at the right time for the company he has come to consider home.
“Sometimes, for all of us, you want to make sure you leave on a high,” he said. “I’m just bubbling over with pride on what we’ve been able to do, and I can say frankly and honestly that I’m so excited for the next chapter of BalletMet.”