MICHAEL FOTHERGILL

Michael is the Executive and Artistic Director of Ballet Arkansas and an internationally recognized performer, dance educator, choreographer, and arts consultant with more than 25 years of experience working in diverse professional environments throughout the United States and abroad. A respected leader in the performing arts, Michael is the 2026 recipient of the Arkansas Arts Council's Governor's Arts Award for Community Development, recognizing his transformational contributions to the arts and cultural landscape of Arkansas.

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His career and leadership have earned sustained recognition across the arts, business, and civic sectors. Michael has been named among Arkansas’s 250 most influential leaders, a Visionary in the Performing Arts, one of Arkansas’s Top 100 Professionals, an Arkansas Money & Politics Influencer, and a Man on a Mission, and has been recognized as a 2026 Man of Distinction. He is also included in Who’s Who in America. These distinctions reflect a career spanning international performance, artistic creation, education, executive leadership, organizational transformation, and community development.

 

Michael is available year-round for consulting engagements with nonprofit arts organizations, universities, and cultural institutions. He is a frequent guest teacher in pre-professional, collegiate, and professional training environments, stages both his own choreographic works and repertoire by other distinguished choreographers, and is a sought-after speaker and presenter on topics including arts leadership, nonprofit management, audience development, arts education, entrepreneurship, and the role of the arts in community revitalization.