Nikolais, Alwin

Related Category: Dance: Biographies

(nĭk´´əlī´), 1910–93, American dancer and choreographer, b. Southington, Conn. Nikolais became director of his own dance company in New York City in 1949. He made ingenious use of colors, lighting, and sound as integral parts of such abstract and exhilarating dance works as Kaleidoscope (1956), Imago (1963), Tent (1968), Scenario (1971), Gallery (1978), Velocities (1986), and Aurora (1992). Many of his works have been presented on television in the United States and Great Britain. In 1989 his dance company merged with that of Murray Louis.