Dance Theatre of Harlem is a leading dance institution of unparalleled global acclaim, encompassing a performing Ensemble, a leading arts education center and Dancing Through Barriers®, a national and international education and community outreach program.
Each component of Dance Theatre of Harlem carries a solid commitment towards enriching the lives of young people and adults around the world through the arts.
Founded in 1969 by Arthur Mitchell, the Dance Theatre of Harlem made its official debut on January 8, 1971, at the New York Guggenheim Museum with three chamber ballets by Mitchell. During the same season the company’s repertory was supplemented with several ballets by George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins. Dance Theatre of Harlem was considered “one of ballet’s most exciting undertakings” (The New York Times, 1971).
Shortly after the assassination of The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Mitchell was inspired to start a school that would offer children — especially those in Harlem, the community in which he was born — the opportunity to learn about dance and the allied arts.
In 1981 the Dance Theatre of Harlem became the first black company to appear at Covent Garden. In 1992, the company toured to South Africa in the “Dancing Through Barriers” tour that gave birth to the outreach program of the same name that still continues to operate. In 1999, the year of the company’s 30th anniversary, Dance Theatre of Harlem and Mitchell were inducted into the National Museum of Dance and the Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney Hall of Fame in Saratoga Springs, New York
Now in its fourth decade, Dance Theatre of Harlem has grown into a multi-cultural dance institution with an extraordinary legacy of providing opportunities for creative expression and artistic excellence that continues to set standards in the performing arts. Dance Theatre of Harlem has achieved unprecedented success, bringing innovative and bold new forms of artistic expression to audiences in New York City, across the country and around the world.