Margaret Jenkins

[2] She was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1980 and in 2003, San Francisco mayor, Willie Brown, declared April 24 to be Margaret Jenkins Day.

Jenkins began her early training in dance in her hometown of San Francisco with Judy and Lenore Job, Welland Lathrop, and Gloria Unti.

During the 1960s she returned to New York and danced with Jack Moore, Viola Farber, Judy Dunn, James Cunningham, Gus Solomons Jr. and Twyla Tharp's original company with Sara Rudner.

These include Elizabeth Streb, Joe Goode, and Kathleen Hermesdorf[4] Additionally, Jenkins opened one of the first spaces in the city to combine creative research, choreography, and performance in the same building.

In 2004, Jenkins and her company established the Choreographers in Mentorship Exchange (CHIME) with support from the James Irving Foundation.

[3] These included dancers and choreographers Merce Cunningham, Trisha Brown, David Gordon, Yvonne Rainer, and Steve Paxton.

In 2008, Jenkins was commissioned to create a new work for the 75th anniversary of the San Francisco Ballet, one of two women with this distinct honor.

She has also developed ambitious multi-disciplinary works such as Light Moves, an evening-length dance created in collaboration with media artist Naomie Kremer.

A proponent of a fully realized collaborative art, Jenkins has worked with Terry Allen, Alvin Curran, Paul Dresher, Rinde Eckert, David Lang, Bruce Nauman, Naomie Kremer, Alexander V. Nichols, Yoko Ono and others from the fields of dance, music and visual arts.

Additional collaborators were Michael Palmer – poet, Thomas Carnacki - music, David Robertson - lighting design and Mary Domenico – costumes.

[citation needed] In addition, Jenkins conceived The National Dance Lab (NDL) a “product-driven,” as opposed to “market-driven,” model for creativity in the performing arts.