OUR MISSION
Building community through movement, Eryc Taylor Dance (est. 2006) is a New York City-based not-for-profit organization with a mission to advance appreciation of movement through creating and presenting original performances, conducting master classes, and curating movement-based community outreach workshops.
Eryc Taylor Dance (est. 2006) is a multi-mission NYC-based nonprofit founded by Artistic Director and dancer/choreographer Eryc Taylor, who has 35+ years of experience in the professional dance world. ETD uses dance to address critical issues within the local, state, and global communities. Programs include ETD Outreach, New Choreographers Grant, original productions, and workshops. ETD Outreach offers 20+ workshops weekly to vulnerable populations in 14 sites in four boroughs across NYC. New Choreographers Grant annually gives 3-5 emerging choreographers stipends, mentorship, and space to create/showcase their work. ETD’s concert dance repertory includes the ecological crisis alarm call, EARTH (2019, co-choreographed with five NCG recipients), presented at Brooklyn Botanic Garden and on PBS/WNET “Climate Artists.” The ‘90s nightlife-inspired Factory|Refractory, which debuted in 2022, had a six-show residency in NYC and was presented in Provincetown, MA, in 2023. Tours are planned for 2024. ETD’s latest work, CONTINUUM, is in development for a 2025 premiere.
Our community-based ETD Outreach program uplifts and empowers vulnerable populations with multidisciplinary workshops. Since the program’s launch in 2007, ETDO has conducted over 4,000 workshops, bringing the joy of movement, dance, and artistic expression to over 10,000 participants across all five boroughs of NYC and international communities in Mexico and beyond.
OUTREACH
Today, there are ETDO workshops in 14 sites in ten Districts across Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and The Bronx. Partnerships targeting at-risk and under-served communities include The Bridge, Lantern Community Services, Acacia Network, and Postgraduate Center for Mental Health. We have seven artists teaching up to 20 weekly workshops and are adding instructors specializing in visual art, creative writing, and music.
Eight of our ETDO sites focus on seniors in primarily Hispanic, Black, and Asian communities. Many participants face struggles like advanced age and limited mobility, addiction or substance abuse, mental illness, physical disabilities, and isolation.
PERFORMANCE
Eryc Taylor Dance performs and tours globally thanks to sponsorship from MAC Cosmetics, Google Nonprofits, Amazon, Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft, Deutsch Family Wine & Spirits, The Joyce Theater, and more. The Company has performed at venues such as the Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors, Joyce Soho, Theater, Joe's Pub at The Public Theater (NYC), New York Live Arts, Armando Manzanero Teatro and Teatro José Peón Contreras (Merida, Mexico), Martha Graham Studio Theater, Bryant Park Theater, Guild Hall (East Hampton, NY), SLATE (NYC), Mary Heaton Vorse House (Provincetown, MA), Busan Cultural Center (Busan, South Korea), and Province Lands Outdoor Amphitheater (Cape Cod, MA).
COLLABORATION
Artistic Director, Eryc Taylor, is driven through collaboration. Every season the company seeks out unique artists working from costume design to make-up design to photography to music composition. Eryc's love of collaboration has fostered strong relationships and produced beautiful work. Some of these artists include Scooter LaForge, David Kagen, Lois Greenfield, Rachel Neville, Steven Menendez, Daniel Tobias, New Wave Arts, and Gerald Busby.
CORE VALUES
As a non-profit dance company based in New York City, one of our core values is that all our performances, workshops, and events are accessible to provide equal access and opportunity to people with diverse abilities.
Our dance company and diverse team of instructors work with and contract people with disabilities and ensure that all rehearsals, workshops, and performance spaces utilized provide ramps, elevators, and alternative accessibility.
ETD aims to create works that connect with vast, diverse groups. Our intended audiences for most of our projects are multi-generational LGBTQIA+, BIPOC communities, their allies, and anyone who has felt the burden of history’s repetitive nature, struggles with current crises, and longs for freedom and connection at times of trauma and confusion.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Eryc Taylor, President & Artistic Director
Eryc Taylor is the Artistic Director of the NYC-based nonprofit dance company Eryc Taylor Dance, its community outreach program, ETD Outreach, and the New Choreographer Grant program for emerging choreographers. Taylor holds an MFA in Dance from NYU Tisch and has been creating and touring work in NYC, nationally and internationally since 1995 and 2006 with ETD. He has received grants, awards, and government support from NYSCA, LMCC, SVOG, and Dance/NYC. Highlights include ETD tours in Mexico (2016 & 2017) and South Korea (2019); ETD's EARTH (2019), featured on the PBS ALL ARTS series "Climate Artists"; ETD's dance film, Uncharted Territory (2020), receiving critical praise, awards, and several film festivals; Factory/Refractory (2022) a critically acclaimed site-specific immersive dance production inspired by 1990s nightlife presented at SLATE NY for 2022 and 2023 residencies.
Nikita Cotton, Treasurer
Nikita Cotton received a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from New York University and a Juris Doctor from the University of Michigan Law School. Nikita developed her love of the arts while studying abroad in Florence and London. Nikita is deeply committed to social activism and facilitating outreach to underserved communities; in addition to serving on the Board of ETD, Nikita is the Chair of the Junior Board of The Campaign Against Hunger. Professionally, Nikita is a fintech lawyer (NY admission pending) with particular interest in the intersection of financial and racial inequality.
Eric Gunhus, Outreach & Events
Following years as a Broadway performer and decades in theater regionally and abroad, Eric left performing to launch an event company in 2013 forming EG Event Group, specializing in the not-for-profit sector, corporate and social events.
Theater demands a sense of passion for vision, emotion and creativity. It also requires attention to detail, dependability, hard work and, above all, a flair for compelling storytelling. Eric translates client’s visions into tangible feeling through the creation of innovative and impeccably executed experiences. Whether an intimate social celebration, a branded corporate event or fundraising gala, actualizing the story, rooted in a ‘why” is his key to a successful event.
As a co-founded Dancers For Good, a non-profit annual event in the Hamptons benefitting dancers , he fell deeply in love with ETD which has become a returning staple of the annual lineup. Clients include Inc. Business Owners Council, QVC’s FFANY Shoes On Sale, Newsy, Point Foundation, Stuttering Foundation, The Actors Fund, LGBT Network, Robert Marc Eyewear, Elle Macpherson, Rockefeller Group, CAIS, Room & Board and many private social events.
Originally from Iowa, growing up overseas and attending California State University, Eric now lives in New York and East Hampton with his fiancé. He is proud to serve the vital mission and artistry of Eryc Taylor Dance.
Pamela Snyder-Gallagher, Board Member
Pamela Snyder is thrilled to be working again with the multi-talented Eryc Taylor and his equally impressive group of dancers and support staff who make all the magic happen. Pamela’s entrée into the dance world is through costume design, which is how she and Eryc connected during their graduate studies at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. Since then, Pamela has had a freelance career in the Arts, having designed for the stage and screen from off-Broadway to regional theater, opera and dance. Pamela’s interests align with the company’s mission in bringing dance to the people with its varied offerings of workshops that “help people help themselves” through the expressive and therapeutic dance medium. Pamela also has a passion for empowering the next generation and has been teaching at the college level now for 20 years in the NY-metro area. She has been in the public service as resident designer and costume shop supervisor at SUNY’s Hunter College and most recently as an Assistant Professor in the Fashion Design/Art Department at CUNY’s Fashion Institute of Technology where she enjoys exposing students to culture through the History of Clothing.
It takes a village to keep ETD moving forward!
ETD gratefully acknowledges the ongoing contributions from our consultant team: