Smuin Contemporary Ballet is proud to announce the launch of Spring Point, a biennial showcase for early-career choreographers. The company will present new works by four choreographers including longtime Smuin artists Maggie Carey and Cassidy Isaacson alongside Julia Feldman, a member of Sacramento Ballet, and Babatunji, who performs with Alonzo King LINES Ballet. Spring Point takes place February 13-15, 2026 at ODC Theater, and tickets starting at $50 are now on sale at odc.dance/tickets.
In alternating years with Smuin’s Choreography Showcase, a program that first launched in 2007, Spring Point is designed to foster a pipeline of opportunity for emerging choreographers. While the Choreography Showcase is open to all Smuin artists wishing to present new work in a studio setting, Spring Point is a commission-based platform that culminates in fully produced works in a professional theater. Spring Point is open to artists outside of Smuin, and participants receive artistic feedback from established choreographers, including this season Val Caniparoli and Robert Moses.
Since joining Smuin in 2018, after stints with Dayton Ballet and Cincinnati Ballet Second Company, Carey has distinguished herself in works by Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, Jennifer Archibald and Justin Peck, among many others. For Spring Point her starting place has been the 2015 folk-rock album Dear Wormwood by The Oh Hellos. Carey says the piece she’s making for nine dancers is a study in partnering and trios within a larger format, but she continues, “it’s really about making something fun for my friends.”
Isaacson joined Smuin a year after Carey, in 2019, and during her time with the company she’s participated in every Choreography Showcase. One of the works she created, Chapter Two, was conceived as an homage to the start of her new life in San Francisco with Smuin. Now 30 years old, and expecting her first child, she’s at work on a new dance titled Chapter Three, a nod to the next phase of her life. “I want to make a piece that shows a woman’s strength,” she says.
Feldman has created 17 original works, including four longer commissions, for Sacramento Ballet since joining the company in 2011. Among her many accolades, she was selected for the National Choreographer’s Initiative in 2019 and the New York Choreographic Institute’s Spring Session in 2022. Next year, she’ll travel to Chicago to take part in the Grainger Academy of the Joffrey Ballet’s 2026 Winning Works Choreographic Competition, then to Milwaukee where she will compete in Milwaukee Ballet’s Genesis Choreographic Competition.
For Spring Point she’s making an octet. “I am a genuine fan of Smuin’s company artists, and especially given the intimacy of ODC Theater, I want to create something that feels true to them,” said Feldman. “My goal is to build a piece that allows them to bring their full selves to the stage.”
Finally, Babatunji has been dancing with LINES Ballet for more than a decade. In 2015, he was awarded a Princess Grace Award as well as a Chris Hellman Award for his outstanding achievements and promise in the world of dance. As a freelance artist, he has received commissions from SFDanceworks, the København Danser festival in Copenhagen, San Francisco Trolley Dances and The Living Earth Show, among others. Alongside Misty Copeland, he starred in the short dance film Flower, and for ODC Theater’s State of Play festival he co-choreographed a piece with former LINES Ballet dancer David Harvey which was nominated for an Izzie Award.
In his original works, Babatunji is known for blending contemporary ballet with street dance forms. For Spring Point, he’s working with eight dancers, four women and four men. “I want my piece to tell a story,” he said.
“For our art form to continue to evolve, it is vital to put resources into the hands of the next generation of dance creators,” said Artistic Director Amy Seiwert. “By creating a platform for emerging choreographers to flourish, we foster innovation, investing in the future of our field.”
For more information, visit smuinballet.org.
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