About
KRISTALYN GILL, a North Carolina native, graduated from East Carolina University’s Honors College with dual degrees in Dance Performance (BFA) and Interpersonal/Organizational Communication (BS). She is a Renaissance woman, actively embracing the identities of dancer, choreographer, actor, slam poet, author, communication specialist, director, and educator. Above all else, she considers creativity as a conduit for an empathetic community, ignited curiosity, and earnest conversation.
Kristalyn is honored to have worked on such a wide range of projects including Hugh Jackman’s Radio City Music Hall Residency (Ashley Wallen), Rosalía x Saturday Night Live (LA HORDE), Off-Broadway’s 11 to Midnight (Swing/Dance Captain), Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival (Yue Yin Dance Company), Museum of Modern Art (Brian Golden), PUMA (Akira Uchida), Peloton, Athletic Greens One (Mishay Petronelli), New York Fashion Week x Lemonade Dolls, and Intuit.
Other notable credits include Seminole Hard Rock Casino, BODYTRAFFIC Guest Artist, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Fire Island Dance Festival, Intuit, Possession (Parker Finn), Soul Project Dance Company (Candace Brown), Schrittmacher Festival, Feud (FX), and Suspicion (Apple TV+).
She has performed original work by Ashley Wallen, Yue Yin, Joseph Hernandez, Akira Uchida, Kristen Céré, Candace Brown, Bo Park, Theresa Stone, Brian Golden, Mishay Petronelli, Menghan Lou, Mark Haim, Franco Nieto, and Eric Delgado. Additionally, Kristalyn holds immense gratitude for training under the direct leadership of artists such as Diana Matos (MOTUS the Company Member of the Month), Victor Quijada, Galen Hooks, Micaela Taylor, Andrea Miller, James Alonzo, Tobias Ellehammer, Jessica Castro, Sidra Bell, Sekou, Cat Rendic, Jon Rua, and Candace Brown, and Sam Javier.
As a choreographer, her interdisciplinary choreographic works have toured nationally at Koresh Dance Company’s Come Together Festival (PA) and Chicago's Harmony Music and Dance Festival among other venues. Kristalyn has taught at local facilities such as a faculty member at Steps on Broadway, Peridance Center, and Broadway Dance Center while also sharing her work internationally at the Hub (London), NW Dance Project, BodyVox, and East Carolina University. Kristalyn was the 2023 New Work Grant Recipient through the Queens Arts Fund for her evening-length work “LOOK AT ME,” which studies the complexities of the human desire to be seen, known, and loved. Kristalyn was also a 2024 National Performing Arts Funding Exchange featured art-maker. Most recently, she received the 2026 Creative Fellowship Commission from Creative.NYC to create the short film “is that all there is?”
As a writer, Kristalyn has authored four poetry books and was the 2021 Fall Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts Poetry Fellow. Her newest poetry collection Purification in Queens was released by Fernwood in December 2024. Her work lives in the intersection of reclaiming femininity and faith, described as "shape and movement viscerally across each page in the throes of grief, trauma, and triumph of girlhood (Maya Williams, Portland Poet Laureate)." Kristalyn’s poetry credits include the Bowery Poetry Club (feature), Inspired Word’s NYC Voices (feature), Arts on Site, Dancegeist, Port Veritas, Unfortunately I Love You, Isol:Art, Dead Dads Club, "While We Wait: A Tale of Fallen Fruit" by Soul Project Dance Company, and "B_TTERLAND" by SHINSA the Collective.
As a contracted communication specialist, Kristalyn has worked with organizations such as Yue Yin Dance Company, GALLIM Dance Company (Communications Coordinator), Soul Project Dance Company, BodyVox Dance Center, First Image (Interim Communications Director), and Smashworks Dance Collective.
Kristalyn was the Founder of Dive and Dine which provides creatives with a space for open discuss about identity and ingenuity. Although monthly gatherings are on hiatus, Dive and Dine (when in session) offered an annual grant cycle for the Plunge Development Grant, whose funds are given to an art-maker who uses their work as a conduit for community conversation and exchange.
Photography by Mike Esperanza, Paolo Verzani, Geo Mantilla, and It Is Good Faith + Arts Festival.