BFA in Dance and Choreography and Minor in General Business from Virginia Commonwealth University

Office: MCD 203
Email: kara.robertson@utah.edu

Kara Robertson is a Choreographer, Educator, and Director originally from Richmond, Virginia working towards her MFA in Modern Dance. She founded and served as Artistic Director and Choreographer of Karar Dance Company, a 501(c)3 nonprofit professional contemporary dance company, for seven years.  Kara was also on faculty at the University of Mary Washington in the Department of Theatre in Dance in Fredericksburg, Virginia as an Adjunct Professor.  She is also a 2024 Virginia Commission for the Arts Choreographic Fellow.  Her work is primarily focused on choreography where she is moved to exhibit the delicate balance of strength and fragility. 

Kara has presented work throughout Virginia, Washington, D.C., Maryland, Tennessee, North Carolina, New York, Philadelphia, and Utah. Her work has been seen at Movers + Makers hosted by Wasatch Contemporary Dance, the Red Rock Dance Festival at Utah Tech University, the American Dance Guild Festival at the Ailey Citigroup Theater, and at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts for the National American College Dance Association Festival.  She has self-produced four concerts of her choreographic work for Karar Dance Company in Richmond and was the 2019 Dogtown Presenter’s Series selected artist where she premiered her first evening length work Circadian, inspired by the photographic work of Fan Ho.  Kara is the recipient of a residency presented by Virginia Commonwealth University’s Department of Dance and Choreography and the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation in 2022 that sparked the creation process for her work Shapeshifter. 

Kara has served as a guest artist at Dogwood Dance Project, Virginia Commonwealth University, Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Dallas, Texas, South East Dance Academy in Wilmington, North Carolina, Salem High School Visual and Performing Arts Academy in Virginia Beach, and Henrico High School Center for the Arts and Thomas Dale Specialty Center for the Arts in Richmond. 

Kara and her work have received attention by Style Weekly, RVArt Review, RVA Magazine, CultureWorks Richmond, Virginia this Morning on Channel 6, VCU Alumni, and Broadway World. She has received multiple grants from the Virginia Commission for the Arts and the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation to provide education and access to artists in the greater Richmond area. 

Kara was a resident artist at the 2019 Mudhouse Residency in Agios Ioannis, Crete. She has also attended the Chunky Move and Countertechnique Workshop with then Chunky Move Artistic Director, Anouk Van Dijk in New York City. Kara was selected for Doug Varone and Dancers’ DEVICES Choreographic Mentorship and Intensive which culminated in the premiere of her work StandStill at Gibney Dance in August 2016 in New York City. 

Kara graduated Magna Cum Laude from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2016 earning a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance and Choreography and minor in General Business. She was the recipient of the VCU Dance Bobby Chandler Award in Honor of Chris Burnside and Outstanding Choreographer award. Kara also studied at ImPulsTanz Vienna International Dance Festival with support from the VCUarts Dean’s International Study Grant.