Ronald K. Brown

Ronald K. Brown, raised in Brooklyn, NY, founded EVIDENCE / A Dance Company in 1985. He has worked with Mary Anthony Dance Theater and Jennifer Muller/The Works, as well as other choreographers and artists. Brown has set works on Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Ailey II, Cleo Parker Robinson Dance Ensemble, Dayton Contemporary Dance Company, Jennifer Muller/The Works, Jeune Ballet d’Afrique Noire, Ko-Thi Dance Company, PHILADANCO!, Muntu Dance Theater of Chicago, Ballet Hispánico, TU Dance, and Malpaso Dance Company. 

Brown has collaborated with such artists as composer/designer Omotayo Wunmi Olaiya, the late writer Craig G. Harris, director Ernie McClintock’s Jazz Actors Theater, choreographers Patricia Hoffbauer and Rokiya Kone, and composers Jason Moran, Arturo O'Farrill, Meshell Ndegeocello, Robert Een, Oliver Lake, Bernadette Speech, David Simons, and Don Meissner. 

Brown is the recipient of the 2020 Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award. His other awards and recognitions include the AUDELCO Award for his choreography in Regina Taylor’s award-winning play Crowns, two Black Theater Alliance Awards, and a Fred & Adele Astaire Award for Outstanding Choreography in the Tony Award-winning Broadway and national touring production of The Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess, adapted by Suzan-Lori Parks, arrangement by Diedre Murray and directed by Diane Paulus. 

Brown was named Def Dance Jam Workshop 2000 Mentor of the Year and has received the Doris Duke Artist Award, the New York City Center Fellowship, the Scripps American Dance Festival Award, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, the National Endowment for the Arts Choreographers Fellowship, the New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, the United States Artists Fellowship, a New York Dance and Performance Bessie Award, the Dance Magazine Award, and The Ailey Apex Award. 

Brown is Co-Artistic Director of RestorationART Youth Arts Academy Pre-Professional Training Program / Restoration Dance Youth Ensemble, and a member of Stage Directors & Choreographers Society.