Jill Henis named new dancer in residence

Following a call to artists, Jill Henis has been selected as the next dancer in residence, starting in January 2026 and concluding in June 2026. Through the Dance Residency program, the Edmonton Arts Council (EAC) champions Edmonton’s dance community by igniting creation, experimentation, collaboration, and meaningful connection. For the program’s second intake, the EAC partnered with Arts Habitat Edmonton to provide the next dancer in residence with dedicated studio space, supporting six months of focused exploration, practice, and artistic development. 

Originally from Vancouver, Jill is an international dance artist, choreographer, rehearsal director, dramaturge, director, teacher, and mentor. Guided by curiosity, Jill approaches her work as a practice of listening — to the body, to lived experience, to embodiment as something shared, porous, and relational — attending to how we interface with ourselves and the communities we inhabit.

During the residency, she seeks to investigate themes of identity, transformation, connection, and resilience, attending to both individual journeys and collective narratives. Jill plans to undertake open-ended, rigorous research into dance-making from the perspective of a mature artist — turning inward, tracing experience and memory, and exploring how reflection and inquiry might open new pathways in her practice and choreographic language.

Read on to learn more about Jill, her vision for the residency, and what we can expect over the next six months. 

What drew you to apply for this opportunity?

I was drawn to this residency because it offers something that feels increasingly rare: time. A dedicated six-month container to slow down, study, listen — to be in inquiry without the pressure of needing to produce something finished. As a mature dance artist, it’s easy to fall into familiar pathways. Sometimes we call that professionalism. Sometimes leadership. But I’ve learned that familiarity can quietly harden into habit, and habit can dull curiosity. I know how easy it is to stay inside what I already know and to stop asking the harder questions. I’ve been there. 

Often, with good intentions, we end up repeating old ideas of success or reinforcing ways of working that no longer serve us. Familiarity can feel safe, but I’m not convinced it’s always what allows us to grow. At the same time, I deeply honour what has come before. I’m not interested in throwing anything away — I’m interested in sifting. In asking what still holds gold, and what new excavation might bring forward. 

Mary Oliver writes, ​“When I went back to the sea it wasn’t waiting. Neither had it gone away.”
That line stays with me. It reminds me that what matters remains — but it doesn’t stand still. 

After a long career as a dancer, teacher, choreographer, and director, I feel ready to loosen my grip on outcome. Not because I don’t value craft or rigour — I do — but because I’m increasingly aware of how easily familiarity can be mistaken for truth. Without reflection, we can begin to mistake endurance for integrity, or difficulty with depth. 

This residency offers me a way to stay accountable to the intimacy and rigour of my practice, and to allow whatever emerges to reshape how I create, teach, collaborate, and share — with others, not in isolation. 

Tell us a little about your vision for the residency.

It feels important to say that this residency is just beginning. And because of that, I’m hesitant to speak too definitively about ​“vision.” I want to avoid defining a destination and risk closing off the unknown. I’m working with the title Between Stillness and Flight — a conversation among echoes; a living record of discovery.

I applied for this opportunity with a proposal grounded in structure and intention, but I’m equally committed to loosening the notion that ​“vision” must mean knowing where we’re headed. In many ways, this residency will ask me to step away from planning a destination and instead to commit fully to presence. To enter without a clear horizon. That, to me, feels like the soul of the work — and perhaps my greatest challenge.

I’ll be supported by a ​‘guardian dramaturge’ — someone who can act as a mirror, a witness, and a point of accountability. That relationship will help me stay honest, especially around what I might be avoiding. Documentation and reflection will be part of the process, not to perform it, but to stay connected and transparent.

Although this is a solo inquiry, it’s not a solitary one. I’ll invite other artists — dancers, visual artists, sound designers, writers — into moments of exchange. I deeply believe that even our most personal work is shaped by those around us. We don’t discover alone. The residency becomes a shared container, where individual inquiry and collective reflection can inform and strengthen one another.

In what ways do you see this residency impacting the local dance and arts ecology?

With immense gratitude, I see this residency as a way of affirming that artistic growth as a dance artist doesn’t have an expiry date. That curiosity doesn’t diminish with experience — it deepens. By choosing inquiry over immediate product, this residency speaks to the importance of care, nourishment, and reflection throughout an artist’s life.

I hope it offers something to the community not by presenting answers, but by modelling permission — to pause, to question, to change course. To value process as much as outcome. And to remember that maturity in practice is not about arriving but about staying available.

This residency feels like a meaningful way to affirm the value of dance artists — whose ongoing commitment to research plays a vital role in sustaining a thriving, connected arts community.

In beautiful ways, this residency also allows me to share resources directly — through commissions and exchanges with local dancers and across disciplines. Even in solo inquiry, we hold responsibilities to the ecosystems we’re part of. A thriving dance community depends on relationships, generosity, and mutual acknowledgement.

At its heart, I hope to see this residency as a small but mighty contribution to the cultural life of Edmonton. A reminder that art is not only something we make — it’s something we live. It reflects our shared humanity, and it shapes how we care for one another.

Jill’s dance residency at the Orange Hub is now underway and will conclude in June 2026. You can learn more about Jill’s work by visiting her website https://​jill​henis​works​.com/ and follow the EAC blog for updates about the residency.