Leslie Guyton 
Artistic Director
graduated magna cum laude from Emerson College in 2006 with a major in Theater Studies: Directing & Musical Theater and a minor in Political Communication. While at Emerson, Guyton met Liza Hostetler-Ingalls with whom she began collaborating on dance theater works. The first of their collaborations resulted in Black Feathers in 2005, premiering at John Hancock Hall in Boston. Black Feathers was created as a tribute to famed German choreographer Pina Bausch by honoring her aesthetic and process of developing work.
Following Black Feathers, Guyton and Hostetler-Ingalls formed the Movement Workshop Group, a dance theater company dedicated to creating original dance theater hybrid productions. Their first work with the group was Dust to Dust, which was performed in 2006 through the Destination Dance program at the Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center. This piece compared the disparity of 1930’s America with the desperation of those currently affected by the American health care crisis.
Upon completion of this work, Guyton moved to Seville, Spain where she traveled Europe for an observership with Pina Bausch’s Tanztheater Wuppertal in Germany and Portugal. In September 2007, Guyton moved to New York City where she attended classes and performed at La Mama Experimental Theater Club. Guyton and Hostetler-Ingalls were commissioned in February of 2008 to create a 20 min. work in progress for the Moving Men Series at Dixon Place in New York City. She has since continued her observership with Pina Bausch in London, England while they presented The Rite of Spring and Café Müller and again at the Brooklyn Academy of Music for Bamboo Blues.
Guyton was Production Manager for New Dance Alliance’s Performance Mix Festival 2008 at Joyce SoHo. Guyton and Hostetler-Ingalls toured Moontides in 23,149 Parts during the fall of 2008 in Philadelphia, New York and Boston. Guyton is Program Assistant at Trinity/La Mama as well as Assistant to the Executive Director at the Martha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance in New York City. She recently presented her newest work in collaboration with Eliza Lay through MWG New York called Wanderlust and attended the Lincoln Center Directors Lab in July.