A B O U T
Olivia Rowe is the Assistant Artistic Director of Druid Hills Dance Center in Decatur, Georgia. She is also a professional dancer, choreographer, educator, and stage manager. She is currently a candidate for a Masters of Arts in Dance from California State Long Beach, and will graduate with the degree in December 2024. In 2018, she graduated from Kennesaw State University with a Bachelor of Arts in Dance. ​
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As a choreographer, Olivia seeks to discover and reflect the beauty and variability of the human experience through expressionism & surrealism. Olivia is blessed to work daily with the dancers of the Druid Hills Dance Company, choreographing hundreds of works there since her beginning there in 2019. Most recently, her work has received the 2024 Artistic Excellence and Performance Award from the Kennesaw State University High School Dance Festival for her work Danu. Her pieces, Ayni (2024) and Kenopsia (2023), both won first place in their divisions at their respective competitions (KAR 2024, Applause Talent 2023). In 2022, she presented process with The Esthete Collective in a split bill performance alongside Fuerta Dance Company, entitled “WAKE.” The Collective presented two new works in 2021 including Nubivagant, performed alongside Profectus Dance in their production "The Seeds We Plant." In 2020, she was commissioned by musician Desmond Meyers to choreograph music video Real Man. That same year, she presented two new works in collaboration with The Esthete Collective; The first being aphotic|lucent at Excuse the Art presented by Fly on a Wall, and the second being ALPHA STATE, a dance film presented at FEMMEfest. She has also presented works in festivals such as Fall for Fall Dance Festival, 3 Contemporary Dance Project, and Palette Project. In 2018, her work, Matutine, was danced by Ballet Southeast in their inaugural mixed repertory showcase. Also in 2018, her senior capstone project, Dichotomic, was presented by the Kennesaw State Dance Co. in their annual Senior Spring showcase.
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Olivia is a current company member with Fuerta Dance Company, and has been performing with the troupe since 2019. Additional professional performance endeavors include companies City Gate Dance Theater, Ballet Southeast, and Gotta Dance Contemporary (now Admix Project), where she has performed both classical and contemporary works.
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In high school, Olivia trained at Atlanta Academy of Ballet as a professional trainee, as well as Balletmet Columbus and Nashville Ballet. She received her early dance education at Impact Dance of Atlanta. In college, she was privileged to study Gaga dance technique at the Batsheva Dance Company in Tel Aviv, Israel.
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Olivia also works in stage management and theater production, and has been honored to work with companies such as the Vail Dance Festival, Terminus Modern Ballet Theatre, Bluebird Uncaged, Fly on a Wall, Staib Dance, and more. She received her dance production training at Kennesaw State under the guidance of David J. Tatu, and now works at the Kennesaw State Dance Theater as a stage manager and crew member.
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As an educator, Olivia has fostered a love of dance in students of all ages. She is experienced in teaching classical ballet, contemporary, modern, pointe, lyrical, cross-training, and pas de deux. She incorporates pedagogical and kinesiological principles learned in her collegiate studies into all classes, encouraging safe and healthy practice. Olivia has taught for countless studios and schools across Metro-Atlanta, but is happy to call Druid Hills Dance Center “home.”
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A R T I S T S T A T E M E N T
As a choreographer, I seek to discover and reflect the beauty and variability of the human experience through expressionism & surrealism. I believe in using dance as a form of self-expression, meaning each of my compositions are a unique reflection of my own lived experience. Creating my work is often a positive channel for catharsis, and my goal is to stir some kind of emotion for my audience, as well. For me, dance is a tool for creating beauty, but more so finding beauty in the unremarkable, the somber, the macabre. I am a deep feeler, an introverted thinker, and a slow and steady mover. I revel in time to think and moments of quiet. I am obsessed with the idea of beautiful things, and believe that every moment has beauty that I can find and reflect through movement. I have always loved the idea of “world building,” and lean toward surrealism in my aesthetic to do so. Through this process, I can take a theme, an idea, or an emotion, and abstract it in a way that creates an entire world in which I and the dancers can play. Surrealism is not bound by this world’s laws, and allows for unusual things to happen. Aesthetically speaking, I am inspired by many things, but am myself a practitioner of Ballet and Contemporary, and look for typical markers of these styles such as technique, musicality, dynamics, and uniformity when it is called for. Oftentimes, my concepts lean toward more somber, or dark themes, or unique variations of common ideas. What is most “beautiful,” to me is a dancer connected to the emotion of a piece, regardless of what that emotion may be. In my work, “beautiful,” is a moment when the audience can witness a truly vulnerable moment and experience it as if it were themselves. As a creator, the most important thing I can do is reflect my own experience through dance and hope it inspires, heals, or benefits my audience in some way.