Introducing Molly Heller

Molly Heller is an Associate Professor at the University of Utah’s School of Dance, where she

received the Faculty Excellence Award in Research (2024-2025). Her research investigates

performance as a healing practice and the relationship between physical expression and emotion. She is also the director and founder of Heartland, a multi-disciplinary art collective centralized in Salt

Lake City. Her choreographic work has been presented by internationally and nationally recognized

centers such as: National Theater Mannheim (Mannheim, Germany), Centro Internazionale Di

Quartiere (Milan, Italy), Danspace Project at St. Mark’s Church (NYC), Movement Research at the

Judson Church (NYC), Green Space (Queens, NY), DUMBO Dance Festival (Brooklyn, NY), The

Mahaney Center for the Arts (Middlebury, VT), Eccles Regent Street Blackbox Theater (SLC), and

Kingsbury Hall for TEDx Salt Lake City, to name a few. She has also been commissioned to create

new works for the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company (SLC),

Repertory Dance Theatre (SLC), Shawl-Anderson Dance Center (Berkeley, CA), Balance Dance

Company (Boise, ID), Boise State University (Boise, ID), Westminster College (SLC), and Sugar

Space Studio for the Arts (SLC). Molly holds an M.F.A. in Modern Dance from the University of

Utah and has certifications in Pilates and Reiki. She currently dances for New York-based

choreographer Joanna Kotze.

mollyheller.com

Who makes up your art circle?

As a Salt Lake City–based dance maker and educator, I collaborate with University of Utah

creatives, students, and researchers, as well as with artists, musicians, and designers outside

academia who enrich the multidisciplinary ways in which I love to work. I'm grateful to travel

often to New York City and the Bay Area, where I perform, engage in creative projects, and

teach in diverse settings.

How do you expand your art circle?

By staying curious and a bit courageous — going to shows beyond dance, watching films,

listening to live music, chatting with people at my neighborhood coffee shop, staying after events

to connect, reading about topics unrelated to the arts (and recognizing how everything eventually

connects), researching unfamiliar music and its artists’ histories, and traveling. Traveling helps

me better understand how I want to contribute to my local art circles and strengthen their

interconnectedness. It also inspires me to collaborate in creating events that help others expand

their own art circles, such as hosting dance parties and pop-up neighborhood performances.

What value do you see in having a creative community?

Being part of a creative community is essential — it brings vitality and serves as the foundation

where all aspects of my life can align. It offers meaningful relationships that both challenge and

nurture me, and it reminds me to stay mutable, curious, and hopeful.

How does your artistic approach contribute to your community?

As a hybrid artist, my creative threads are many — dance, emotion, philosophy, mixed media,

and location-based work. Each facet informs the others, interweaving how we feel, connect, and

locate ourselves — in our bodies, in relation to others, and in the spaces we share.

In a world that’s rapidly shifting— socially, culturally, politically, medically, economically — I

see the arts as both anchor and compass. My practice welcomes this uncertainty. It leans into

improvisation, values collaboration as a source of new knowledge, honors creative

resourcefulness, and centers people over product.

At the core of my work is a commitment to Becoming — a term and practice that speaks to

fluidity, process, and continual transformation. Rather than striving for fixed outcomes, I value

the unfolding — the growth that happens through movement, in dialogue, and with uncertainty.

Through choreography, performance, wellness, teaching, and by directing Heartland, a

multidisciplinary collective, I contribute to a community of artists devoted to curiosity, care, and

co-creation.

Headshot photo credit: Marissa Mooney

Long View, commissioned by the Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company: Photos by Stuart Ruckman

Heartland: Studies of the Heart: Photo by Tori Duhaime