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Stephanie Tooman

Associate Professor of Dance

Stephanie Tooman is an internationally renowned teacher of the Martha Graham Technique. She has taught at the Martha Graham School, the Alvin Ailey School, and is tenured faculty at the Purchase College Conservatory of Dance, State University of New York. She also has taught extensively internationally, including being the first invited teacher of the Graham technique at the Beijing Dance Academy, China, and taught years at Los Talleres in Mexico City. She has held teaching positions at the Rotterdam Dance Academy (The Netherlands), the Institute del Theatre (Barcelona, Spain), and taught intensives at Copenhagen Contemporary Dance School (Denmark), the New National Theater in Japan, in Taipei, Taiwan, and has been faculty at the Netherlands Dance Theater, first and second companies (The Hague, The Netherlands). Additionally, Stephanie has guest taught at The Philadelphia School of Dance Arts, Philadanco, Juneau, Alaska Summer Program, in Kona and Hilo, Hawaii, and the North East Dance Convention, Master classes at Yale, and more.

Tooman has performed professionally with the Martha Graham Dance Company, as well as many other companies, including Kazuko Hirabayashi, Clive Thompson Dance Company, the Reggie Wilson Fist and Heel Performance Group, Merian Soto/Pepatian, Neta Pulvermacher, Gina Gibney, Nathan Trice, Earl Mosely, Muna Tseng, Errol Grimes and Earnest Morgan and Friends. These dance companies have taken Tooman on extensive touring throughout the USA, Asia, Europe, Canada and Southern Africa.

Tooman has also served as rehearsal director for Kazuko Hirabayashi, most notably in Tokyo at the New National Theater for Hirabayashi’s full-length Faust. She has also been rehearsal director for Neta Pulvermacher, Errol Grimes, and the Purchase Dance Company.

Tooman currently serves as a founding board member of VIM VIGOR/Shannon Gillen Dance Company, and holds advisory positions on 360 Dance Company, The Coleman Collective, and The Martha Hill Dance Foundation. Tooman received a Bessie Award for Dance and Performance for Sustained Achievement in her work with Reggie Wilson.

Tooman holds an MFA from the Purchase College Conservatory of Dance, and a BFA from the Juilliard School. Tooman also trained at the Alvin Ailey School where she was the recipient of a full merit scholarship for a year and 3 summers, under the mentorship of Denise Jefferson. As a student at Alvin Ailey, Tooman was selected by Mr Ailey as the central soloist as he created a new piece for his company, and worked with Ulyses Dove, Donald Byrd, and George Faison among others. She was also chosen as a representative and demonstrator for Ms Jefferson at the Cologne Dance Festival in 1986.

Tooman is the mother of teenagers Senlee and Arthur.