Hedwig Dances Artistic Director and Founder
Jan Bartoszek’s artistic credentials include fellowships from the NEA (1) and Illinois Arts Council (8), mentoring of numerous artists and leadership role in making dance a vital force at the Chicago Cultural Center. She has choreographed over 55 dances in her career that critics have described as “intelligent, accomplished, moving” (Chicago Tribune) and “poignantly human” (Chicago Reader). These dances have been presented in national performance venues and internationally in Honduras, Brazil and Canada. Throughout her career, Ms. Bartoszek has fostered a spirit of collaboration with other artists; merging choreography, media, text and music to create highly theatrical dances.
Ms. Bartoszek was honored with a Ruth Page Award and included in “100 Women Making a Difference” by Today’s Chicago Woman Magazine in recognition of her artistic contribution to the Chicago cultural community. Her choreography credits include work for Steppenwolf, Northlight, Live Bait and Court theaters, as well as with director Ping Chong. As a performer, she toured nationally and internationally with Ping Chong & Company and the Charlie Vernon Performance. Ms. Bartoszek has served on the Advisory Board of the Arts & Business Council of Chicago, the Board of the Chicago Dance Coalition, and dance panels for the Illinois Arts Council and the Oregon Arts Commission. She is the co-founder and co-curator of the annual Dance for Camera program at the Chicago Cultural Center and has participated in the development and implementation of many other dance programs including Dance Bridge and About Dance. Jan has served on the dance faculty at Northwestern University as well as at the School of the Art Institute/Chicago; Roosevelt University and the University of Chicago. She recently completed Arch of Repose, a poetic dream-like dance film with Daniel Kullman and Nicolas DeGrazia of Bitter Jester Creative. The film was the culmination of a year-long process of dance research and development as a 2008 Chicago Dancemakers Forum Lab Artist.
