“A Season of Release, Resilience, and Radical Becoming” is the theme of Collage Dance Collective’s 16th season. 

Performances begin Friday, Oct. 10, with “Let it Fall” at Playhouse on the Square. It features a world premiere. 

“I feel all the things,” Marcellus Harper, co-founder and executive director, said about the upcoming season. “It feels like we’ve been doing this for a while, but also feels like we’re just getting started.”

The organization is at an inflection point, according to Harper. It is maturing, trying to stabilize and putting in place systems to help it become more sustainable.

“We’re … trying to move into a more mature place artistically — really trying to refine our artistic voice, mature our artistic voice, “ Harper added. “Be more confident and assured (in) who we are as an artistic organization and what we stand for.”

The organization has 14 company dancers, down from 18 last season.

“That speaks more to us trying to right-size, trying to sustain our growth,” Harper said. “There’s been a lot of growth, particularly since 2020. We are being realistic and also cautious about where the industry is headed and also where we are currently with public funding. Government funding. Contributed revenue, in general. What shifts are there and wanting to make sure that we are structured in a way that’s going to be able to withstand the change in any shifts that are coming our way.”

Collage Dance Collective’s $25,000 National Endowment for the Arts grant was canceled earlier this year.

Harper said that it was not only financially disappointing but philosophically disappointing. 

“...To get support from the NEA really validates the work, it’s a badge of honor,” he said. “It says you’ve been seen. That the work is important and it’s been recognized by one of the highest funders of the land. And it’s different than a lot of other gifts you may receive that are relational, relationship-based. So this isn’t relationship-based; it’s based solely on the merit of the work. For many years, to aspire to have that validation and to have that taken away is deflating.”

Harper and artistic director Kevin Thomas founded the organization as a response to the lack of diversity in ballet in 2006 in New York and moved Collage Dance Collective to Memphis a year later. In 2009, Collage Dance Collective opened a conservatory to train the next generation of dancers.

 In 2012, Collage Dance Collective began leasing a studio on Broad Avenue and in 2020 opened its own 22,000-square-foot building at Tillman Street and Sam Cooper Boulevard. 

Times are challenging, Harper said. There is a community perception when people look at Collage Dance Collective’s growth and its building that the organization is “thriving.”

Harper said that the organization is struggling to meet its revenue goals and the cost of doing business has outpaced its ability to raise money. 

“The cost to maintain the building, trying to maintain competitive salaries, it’s all increased at a rate that’s higher than our ticket sales and tuition and the things we use to cover it,” Harper. “All that to say: We need support.”

To deal with gaps, Collage Dance Collective has started a new membership program as one strategy to boost earned revenue. 

The three-tiered membership program includes ticket packages, discounts on tickets and programming like adult dance classes, discounted building rental fees, and access to the organization’s online performance library.

The upcoming season includes new and returning dance works and programs.

“Let it Fall,” which takes place Oct. 10-12 at Playhouse, includes a world premiere: “Only Light, Only Love” by Nicolo Fonte and a Memphis premiere: “Four Solitudes” by Crystal Pite (accompanied by a Memphis Symphony Orchestra musician). It also includes work from Alvin Ailey alumna Hope Boykin, called “I Am My Work: A Statement of Grace,” and the return of “The Rate in Which I Am” by Joshua Manculich.

Harper described the program as four unique, contemporary works by acclaimed choreographers. It’s accessible, he said, but also sophisticated.

Regardless of the program, Harper said the organization wants to ensure there is something for everyone and that there are entry points for people new to dance. He also feels it’s important to push the audience to help them grow and see dance in a new way.

Collage Dance Collective brings its annual “Rise” show back Feb. 20-22, 2026, at the Cannon Center for the Performing Arts.

“Rise” centers on its namesake, Kevin Thomas’ ballet set to Martin Luther King Jr.'s “Mountaintop” speech.

New this year is Thomas’ world premiere of “The Cotillion,” inspired by Black Southern cotillions.

“We’ve been partnered with The Links, Inc.,” Harper said. The Memphis Chapter and Shelby County Chapter for almost a decade, choreographing and working with them on cotillions and beautillions. So we have personally worked with hundreds of debutantes and beaus and (teaching them) how to waltz, teaching them upper body carriage, teaching them how to present themselves. And being part of that legacy and tradition. So presenting a ballet (based on that) is very exciting.”

The program also includes the Memphis premiere of Kevin Iega Jeff’s “Flack,” which is set to the music of singer Roberta Flack.

The annual spring jazz gala, “Becoming,” is set for April 12, 2026, at the FedEx Event Center at Shelby Farms Park. 

“The spring is all about what comes next,” Herper said. ‘And to believe what’s possible.”

It includes performances from the company, conservatory, and to-be-announced guest artists. It is a fundraiser for the conservatory.

Another returning event is Brazil by Night, a collaboration with Iris Collective on March 28, 2026, at the Collage Dance Center.

This will be the third event in the series, which includes dance, music and food. 

“Iris Fellows, the fellows that are leading this artistically, are from Brazil,” Harper said. “We have dancers from our company that are Brazilian that will be really leading the charge on our end. If you know Collage, follow Collage, (you know) we’ve had a number of Brazilian dancers in the company.” 

Collage Dance Collective also plans to go on another national tour.