New Orleans Second Line

Michelle N. Gibson received her B.F.A. in Dance from Tulane University and her M.F.A. from Hollins University/American Dance Festival at Duke University. She has served for four years as dance faculty at Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Dallas, served as a resident artist at the Ashé Cultural Arts Center in her hometown of New Orleans, and is currently serving as a Professor of Practice in Dance at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX. Gibson’s teaching and choreographic practice comprises all genres of the African Diaspora; Contemporary Afro Modern, Afro Funk, Jazz, and her own New Orleans Second Line Aesthetic. Her current projects involve sharing her aesthetic and New Orleans culture through a series of workshops she’s coined The New Orleans Original BuckShop LLC and she has created a number of original works, including Takin’ it To The Roots, her one woman show supported by the National Performance Network/Visual Artists Network’s Creation Fund which was performed at the Joyce Theater in NYC as a part of Joyce American Dance Platform: Jazz at the Joyce and Jacob’s Pillow’s 90th Anniversary Season (garnering Gibson a feature in the New York Times), Displaced Yet Rebirth performed by Dallas Black Dance Theatre, Origins of Life on Earth with the Ashé Cultural Arts Center, and Voices of Congo Square, a work focused on the rich culture and history of the Black New Orleans Mardi Gras Indians premiering in 2018 at the Black Dance USA conference at the Sun Theatre in St. Louis, MO, and the Orpheum Theater in New Orleans, LA. In the summer of 2022, she was invited to be Grand Marshal for the Ascona Jazz Festival in Switzerland where she led Second Line parades with the community and conducted teaching workshops. Most recently, Gibson choreographed a new work on the students of Ohio State University’s Dance Department, set to premiere in the Fall of 2024.