In her Stride, Alicia Graf Mack

Once referred to as the “Rolls-Royce of American dance,” Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, founded in 1958 by Alvin Ailey, continues to live up to that plaudit. Indeed, recognized by US Congressional resolution as a vital American “Cultural Ambassador to the World,” AAADT has performed for some 25 million people in 71 countries on six continents. Celebrating the human spirit through the African-American cultural experience and the American modern dance tradition, the troupe is currently under the artistic direction of Alicia Graf Mack.

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in Matthew Neenan's “Difference Between.” Photograph by Paul Kolnik

Appointed at the end of 2024, and now in her inaugural season at the helm of the storied troupe, Graf Mack recently embarked on its 2026 national tour. Making stops in cities that include Atlanta, Berkeley and Chicago, the company returns to Los Angeles Music Center’s Dorothy Chandler Pavilion March 25-29, its third year of a four-year residency. For Graf Mack, her journey, it would seem, has come full circle.

Born in San Jose, CA and growing up in Columbia, MD, she trained in ballet and joined Dance Theatre of Harlem under the direction of Arthur Mitchell while still a teen. However, when injury—ankylosing spondylitis, a debilitating form of arthritis—sidelined her, Graf Mack enrolled at Columbia University and graduated with a degree in history.

But dance, obviously in the DNA of every inch of her nearly six-foot tall frame, again beckoned. Graf Mack joined AAADT in 2005, with the New York Times’ John Rockwell describing her first appearance with the company as being, “so good she became the news of the night all by herself,” adding that the performance in Judith Jamison’s new “Reminiscin,’” was “one of those instant star turns.”

When her injury recurred, Graf Mack left in 2008, this time to pursue a master’s degree in nonprofit management from Washington University. She also got married and returned to AAADT in 2011, where she remained through 2014, then becoming an assistant professor at Webster University and an adjunct professor at the University of Houston, as well as at Washington University, before serving as dean and director of the Juilliard School’s Dance Division from 2018-2025.

Becoming AAADT’s fourth artistic director—after Jamison, who inherited the position from Ailey after his death in 1989, and Robert Battle, who left in November, 2023—Graf Mack has all the markings of a fine leader, upholding the classics yet continuing to move the troupe forward with grace, humility and strength.

Fjord Review caught up with the fiendishly busy Graf Mack by phone from Kansas City, another stop on the troupe’s multi-city tour. The conversation ranged from her experience as a former Ailey dancer and the Los Angeles programs, to her relationship with Jamison, and why Ailey’s undisputed masterpiece, “Revelations,” remains a cornerstone of every Ailey season.

Judith Jamison passed away November 9, 2024, and you learned of your appointment shortly thereafter. Had you been in touch with her over the years, and how does it feel following in her footsteps some 14 years after she retired?

Yes, I’d been in touch with Ms. Jamison since my departure from Ailey. I left under her direction in 2008 and then returned to the company in 2011 under Robert Battle’s direction. Of course, she was Artistic Director Emeritus at that time, so she was very much present. When I left in 2014 and began my career in higher education, we stayed in touch.

I started my family and she was an amazing texter. She always sent awesome emojis and I would send pictures of my babies. When I returned to New York as the dean and director of the Juilliard School, she often attended performances and started following the students. She was an incredible mentor to me, and I miss her terribly.

So, yes, upon news of her passing, and I learned I would be stepping into her former role, it felt like a blessing. We don’t often say that when we take on new jobs or roles. My time at Ailey has always felt like a fulfillment, a calling in a way, and really wrapped in my own sense of purpose. Coming into this role at this specific time within the organization felt divinely ordered in some way.

Alicia Graf Mack. Photograph by Andrew Eccles

Wow, that’s beautiful, Alicia! So, in light of your wide-ranging accomplishments, what do you think gave you the tools to be the kind of leader you are?

I think that is the bedrock of it all. Having been part of the company, having known the organization, having a great understanding of the mission and spirit of the organization, that set the terms, because when I started my career in higher education and in leadership, I took all of those values that I learned from dancing with Ailey into my work.

And that helped to strengthen how I like to lead—through a lens of access, of inclusivity, of excellence—and when I had the privilege to work with young dancers who were on the precipice of their careers, I knew exactly how to encourage them with very intentional coaching and technical information.

I also have a deep interest in administration and organizational culture and behavior, so I think that my artistic sensibilities and my strategic and business curiosities have also helped to shape the leader that I am today. I feel very supported by everyone within the Ailey organization, and the team of artistic leaders that I work with are also dancers that I worked with during my time as a performer. It all feels very aligned, and I'm so excited as we step into this new era.

How do you think your experience as a former Ailey dancer helped shape the way you approach artistic direction today?

I came into the company with the dancers already being so excellent. The mark of an Ailey dancer, for me, is one who has a very deep understanding of technical virtuosity and artistic freedom. And I think that in so many ways, Miss Jamison also believed that. She used to say, “We're looking for dancers with a classical lower body in terms of legs and feet, and a modern dance torso.”

So, it’s someone who really understands many different technical languages on the highest level but has a freedom of movement and a very keen sense of musicality. We’re always looking for dancers who are uniquely different. There is no one Ailey dancer that is the same, and that remains true today. And our dancers come from all over the world. They represent many different races, backgrounds, body types. I think that's so important because we always want to represent the people.

And when audience members or young people come to see the Ailey company, we want to see them represented somehow on stage. I think that keeps the legacy moving forward, the pipeline of artists and young people wanting to pursue a life in dance that helps to propel their dreams—when you see some spark on stage and you can connect with that.

It's always very important to stay grounded in the aesthetic and the original idea that Mr. Ailey wanted to give a platform for Black culture and a Black aesthetic through a very universal language of dance.

In L.A., you’ll be doing two different programs, including a new production of Miss Jamison’s “A Case of You,” and three pieces new to L.A.—Fredrick Earl Mosley’s “Embrace,” Matthew Neenan’s “Difference Between” and “The Holy Blues,” a collaboration between Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, Samantha Figgins and Chalvar Monteiro. There’s also a company premiere, Mehdi Walerski’s “Blink of an Eye.” How do these works speak to the troupe’s evolving identity under your leadership?

The idea that Mr. Ailey set so many years ago in 1958, when he founded the company, he not only wanted to have a platform for his own choreography, for his own blood memories, as we always refer to the works that he created, especially his early works that were inspired by his life growing up in Rogers, Texas, and in his early life in Los Angeles, but also wanted to create a platform for other choreographers to showcase their work, specifically choreographers of color.

Mr. Ailey was ahead of his time, because if you think about all the modern dance companies that were finding their footing [then], they were only rooted in that artist's choreography: Paul Taylor, Martha Graham, Merce Cunningham, the Limón Company, all of these companies only performed the works of their founder.

But Mr. Ailey, from the beginning, had this idea about innovating and bringing new voices into the fold, not only to give those choreographers a space to create, but also to stretch the dancers beyond his own choreography. So, this is the blueprint that we follow today in 2026. I feel so empowered by his bravery and by his vision.

While we have many of his works actively in our repertory, every year we find new choreographers to set work on the company, so that we are always stretching and expanding, and are always setting the bar for excellence and diversity in the field. And there are no other 32 dancers that can go from a Ron Brown’s “Grace,” that fuses West African movement and modern dance, to Mehdi Walerski's very contemporary European ballet, to Miss Jamison’s work, to Mr. Ailey’s very rooted modern dance language. That gives us the extremely varied palate to try anything.

Alicia Graf Mack and Jamar Roberts in Judith Jamison's “A Case of You” excerpt from “Reminiscin'.” Photograph by Paul Kolnik

Indeed, and then there’s “Revelations.” How do you keep this iconic work alive, fresh and spiritually resonant for both dancers and audiences?

First, Mr. Aley was a genius. This is how we know, because this work has endured for decades, and it has the same reaction from the audience as it did in 1960 when it premiered. But I think that it comes back to the idea that people want to come to the theater to be moved. You want to have an experience that you feel transformed you in some way.

And I feel that this work, in particular, connects with our audiences across race, across demographics, across generations. Young people, older people connect with this work because it speaks to the universal themes of burden, of struggle and oppression, of resilience, and of joy. It speaks to the resilience of the human spirit.

I feel that, especially in our world today, with all that is going on, you can come to the theater and know that you are going to feel moved. That’s something very special, and also a great responsibility that the Ailey dancers understand and hold. And so, no matter how many times they've performed this work, they approach it with a fresh interpretation and energy to keep it alive.

Do you remember the first time you danced it?

Oh, yes, I remember! Because I loved the company since I was a child, I was familiar with “Revelations.” I joined the company in 2005, so I was very familiar with “Revelations.” And the first thing you learn as a new dancer is the first section of “I’ve Been Buked,” and the last section, we call it the ‘Yellow Section,’ or ‘Move, Members, Move.’

I had 10 days to learn “Revelations,” and another work called “Night Creature.” Then we went to St. Petersburg, Russia, and I made my premiere on the Mariinsky Theater on a raked stage. That was unforgettable to ground your legs in second position, look to the sky, feel the curtain rise, and have this understanding that I am now dipping my toes into this stream of legacy, and it is now my responsibility to carry it forward.

So, I will never forget the first time I stepped into “Revelations,” because I was in such a foreign place, and it had the same response that I remember having as an audience member.

Mr. Ailey once said, “I believe that dance came from the people and that it should always be delivered back to the people.” I’m wondering what your thoughts are on that?

Yeah, that statement is so large and so specific at the same time. When Mr. Ailey founded the company, he wanted to take the movement language of the people that he observed, of the people dancing down the aisles in church, of the people who danced in the juke joints, of the people who walked down the street with a certain swagger.

He understood that as Black people, our movement vernacular is very embedded in all that we do as people of the world. And he took that language and theatricalized it, and fused it with his understanding of concert dance, of modern dance and ballet, and presented the Black aesthetic and Black culture with great dignity and great respect. So, in that way, he was wanting again to represent where he came from, with beauty, and not placing dance on such a high pedestal. He did not want his work to be seen as an elitist art form.

He wanted the everyday person to be able to come in and enjoy the culture in which they lived and moved, and to see it demonstrated with beauty and dignity. I think he wanted to take this high art and bring it back to the people, if you will. He wanted his audience members to be your mother and your grandmother, and people who would go to church every Sunday, and would move like that.

Then they come to the theater and see, “Wow, how beautifully my culture is presented on the stage,” that presenting bodies of color, different bodies on stage, was, in itself, a social justice statement. He also wanted to make sure that art was always accessible, that coming to the theater to touch your spirit, to transform or transport you from your troubles, even just for the two hours that you sit in the theater, was meaningful.

We continue to believe that today, and with choreographers and repertory, I'm specifically also looking for work that demonstrates some sort of hope and joy and transformation. Because I know that we’re going through some really dark moments, I don’t want to bring those moments into the theater. When people come to see the Ailey company, I want their spirits to be lifted before they leave.

Victoria Looseleaf

Victoria Looseleaf is an award-winning, Los Angeles-based international arts journalist who covers music and dance festivals around the world. Among the many publications she has contributed to are the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, Dance Magazine and KCET’s Artbound. In addition, she taught dance history at USC and Santa Monica College. Looseleaf’s novella-in-verse, Isn't It Rich? is available from Amazon, and and her latest book, Russ & Iggy’s Art Alphabet with illustrations by JT Steiny, was recently published by Red Sky Presents. Looseleaf can be reached through X, Facebook, Instagram and Linked In, as well as at her online arts magazine ArtNowLA.

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