Sally Jacques

Sally Jacques, founder and artistic director of the aerial dance company, Blue Lapis Light, creates site-specific aerial dance works that speak to social, political and spiritual dilemmas. A native of England, Jacques’ early career included international performances in Munich, Barcelona, Vienna and Costa Rica. She studied dance at The Place and The Contemporary Dance Center in London and attended the Lee Strasberg Drama School in New York to study improvisation and acting. Jacques also studied experimental theatre at the Institut del Teatre de Barcelona and movement at the Oval Theatre in London as a protege of John Trigger.

Since then, Jacques has created many aerial dance works and has been the recipient of numerous grants and accolades, including the Susan B. Anthony Award for Peace, funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Texas Commission on the Arts, the City of Austin/Arts Commission and Art Matters, New York City. With Jose Luis Bustamante, she was also awarded the 1994 New Forms Regional Initiative Grant (NFRIG) funded by the NEA, the Rockefeller Foundation and the Andy Warhol Foundation. Along with being named, Greater Austin YWCA Woman of the Year for Achievement in the Arts in 2003, she was also honored as a lifetime member of the Golden Key National Honor Society. In addition to these acknowledgments, in 2006 as part of First Night Austin, she was awarded the Samsung Signature Peace Award and was also included in the 2006 "Faces of Austin" installation at the Austin City Hall. In the following year of 2007, Jacques was inducted into the Austin Arts Hall of Fame and later was nominated for a United States Artists Fellowship in 2008.

Jacques is an artist known and recognized for her international efforts against human rights abuse, environmental endangerment, homelessness, and racism, which has inspired her artistic journey through her activist views. For many years, Jacques taught movement to at-risk teenagers, prison inmates, senior citizens, and the differently-abled, making dance accessible for all. She is a featured choreographer in the recently published book, “Site Dance,” (University Press of Florida) and also has her own book, “64 Beds and other Site Works”, that was published in 1996. Her work has been cited in publications around the globe as well as her featured performances on PBS.

Jacques continues to choreograph and produce local, aerial dance works throughout Austin, Texas for the public on office buildings, hotels, bridges and other outdoor spaces. She also provides aerial silk training for experienced and non experienced individuals through classes, workshops, and Blue Lapis Light's Youth Taking Flight program.