New Addition to the AH Team: Kiran Rajagopalan

Arts Horizons is pleased to welcome Mr. Kiran Rajagopalan to our team as the Program Coordinator for the NYC Residencies and Special Populations Department.

Kiran in his Professional Avatar
Photo By:  J. Wesley Beeks

Kiran is an accomplished dancer, choreographer, writer, and educator.  Trained extensively in Bharatanatyam (Indian classical dance) for over 25 years, Kiran has given many acclaimed performances in India, Indonesia, Germany, Spain, France, and the United States.  While living in India from 2007-2014, he organized free dance workshops and performances for underprivileged students in government (public) schools throughout the country.  After returning to the United States to pursue a master’s degree in Performance Studies at NYU, he became a teaching artist in the New York public school system and conducted residencies for 3-8th graders which seamlessly integrate poetry, science, and/or reading comprehension with Bharatanatyam.  He joined Arts Horizons in December 2016 as a program coordinator, and he serves as a liaison between the administrative team in the New Jersey office and the teaching artists and site coordinators for residencies in New York.  He also conducts site visits to assess and evaluate residencies.

Aside from his work in arts education, Kiran regularly conducts workshops, lectures, and demonstrations on Indian classical dance and science.  His “NeuroArt” talks on aesthetics, performance, and neuroscience have been particularly appreciated.  In addition, he is the founder and artistic director of Daya Arts which promotes Bharatanatyam through artist-to-artist collaborations and small ensemble work.  In 2016, he co-founded No Rest in the Kingdom as an initiative to facilitate new conversations between disparate communities of color on issues of gender, race, class, & colonialism in the arts.

Kiran in his Dancer Avatar
Photo By:  Santhosh Raj