Biography

Helen Pickett studied dance at The San Francisco Ballet School. While in school, she performed with San Francisco Ballet Company under the direction of Michael Smuin and Lew Christensen, and later, Helgi Tomasson.

For over a decade, she performed, as a dancer and actor, with Ballet Frankfurt, dir., William Forsythe, becoming a principal in 1991. Helen performed with The Wooster Group, dir. Elizabeth Le Compte, from 1998-2005. She was part of the original cast of the OBIE award winning House/Lights. From 2005 through the present, Helen has been a guest performer in William Forsythe’s Impressing the Czar with The Royal Ballet of Flanders, in Belgium, Holland, France, Scotland, Germany, the Lincoln Center Festival in New York and in London, England at Sadler’s Wells, for which the company received The Laurence Olivier Award for 2008.

In 2005, Mikko Nissinen, director of Boston Ballet offered Helen her first choreographic commission, Etesian. She was awarded a grant from The New York Choreographic Institute in September 2006 for Work in Progress choreographed for Boston Ballet. In 2006, she also choreographed for Sacramento Ballet and Washington Ballet. In 2007 and 2008, she choreographed upon your held-out hand for Louisville Ballet, EVENTIDE for Boston Ballet, Petal for Aspen Santa Fe Ballet, and UNION for Ballet X. Helen’s 2009/10 commissions include Royal Ballet of Flanders, Boston Ballet, Aspen Santa Fe Ballet, Ballet West and Oklahoma City Ballet. In October 2009, Helen was one of the first choreographers chosen to receive Jerome Robbins Foundation's New Essential Works (NEW) Grant.

During the past five years, she has collaborated, as an actress and choreographer, with installation video artists and filmmakers. Helen, who is a founding member of The Rufus Corporation, director Eve Sussman, played the Queen in 89 Seconds at Alcazar, shown at the 2004 Whitney Biennial. It is now in the permanent collection at Museum of Modern Art in New York. The Rufus Corporation’s second film, feature length, The Rape of The Sabine Women, premiered at New York City’s IFC Theater. Helen played Sally Rand in Toni Dove's video installation and feature film, Spectropia.

Helen teaches, Forsythe-based improvisation, her own workshop, entitled The Expansive Artist and ballet throughout Europe and the United States. She will start work on her Master’s Degree starting June 2010.

Helen’s article Considering Cezanne, was published in Dance Europe’s April 2006 issue.