Jacob Henss
Centennial East 211
- About
- Education
- Awards & Honors
Biography
Jacob Henss (he/him) is a dancer, producer, choreographer, and teacher. He currently works at Illinois State University. In the past, he has been an adjunct faculty member at Millikin University. Henss also was a Lecturer for the University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign. He holds an MFA in Dance from UIUC (2022) and is also a graduate of Webster University (2017) with a BA in Dance and Music.
Current Courses
224.001Composition For The Musical Theatre
119.001Jazz Dance I
219.001Jazz Dance II
205.001Modern Dance II
106.001Beginning Classical Ballet
104.001Beginning Modern Dance
112.001Dance Improvisation
205.001Modern Dance II
Research Interests & Areas
My research is the doing and the making of dance as an artform and mode for investigation for ouselves and the shared world around un. These research interests begin with my identity as a starting point and also intertwine my musical background in classical piano. From a dance history perspective, I am specifically interested in contemporary dance, dance theater, and experimental dance choreography. Dance becomes the medium for investigation with reoccurring themes in my work such as camp, maximalism, and classical music and this mingle with my queer identity. Training as a classical musician first, before entering dance, a major component of my research is looking at Classical Music as a genre and how it is utilized in contemporary dance. Some of the questions I interrogate is why classical music is used in contemporary dance so frequently and historically, is Classical music a heritage artifact holding the values from the time period it came from, and do we reflect those in current times when collaborating artistically with this artform?