The 2021-2022 Season marks Victoria Morgan’s 25th and final Season as Cincinnati Ballet’s Artistic Director. To celebrate her remarkable career with Cincinnati Ballet, this season the Company is performing four works choreographed by Morgan during her quarter-century with the organization. Morgan joined Cincinnati Ballet as Artistic Director in 1996. After more than a decade as Artistic Director, she then took on the monumental role of executive leader in 2008, serving as both the Artistic Director and CEO. After experiencing years of growing deficits, under Morgan’s leadership, the Company stabilized its finances, built a healthy and sizeable endowment fund, created an operating reserve, and presented several million-dollar capital projects. During this time, the Company also launched the Cincinnati Ballet Otto M. Budig Academy and expanded education and community engagement programs.
In 2017, with the arrival of Scott Altman as President and CEO, Morgan transitioned to full-time Artistic Director, affording her the opportunity to focus exclusively on artistic excellence. Morgan’s creative contributions to Cincinnati Ballet are myriad. During her tenure, she choreographed numerous one-act and full-length ballets, including world premieres of King Arthur’s Camelot, The Nutcracker, and revised choreography for Cinderella. With her deep roots in the Cincinnati community, Morgan was instrumental in fundraising efforts to secure support for the new 62,000-square-foot Cincinnati Ballet Margaret and Michael Valentine Center for Dance in Walnut Hills.
While construction was underway for the new Dance Center, Morgan responded to the global pandemic with health and safety top of mind, working closely with the Company’s artistic and administrative team to present one of the nation’s first in-person ballet performances after the shutdown. Ballet in the Park was staged at the Procter & Gamble Pavilion in September 2020 and was lauded by The National Endowment for the Arts for its innovation and commitment to creating live dance.
Prior to joining Cincinnati Ballet, Morgan was resident choreographer for the San Francisco Opera and a principal dancer for San Francisco Ballet and Ballet West. She has and continues to serve on numerous boards including Dance USA, Dance Magazine, the NEA evaluation panel, and was a judge for several International Ballet Competitions. Morgan graduated Magna Cum Laude with an M.F.A. from the University of Utah and was honored as a YWCA Career Woman of Achievement in 2009.
In 2023 as the Ballet launched its 60th anniversary season and in honor of two pivotal talents that have been a core part of the Cincinnati Ballet legacy, Victoria Morgan, Cincinnati Ballet Artistic Director for 25 years, was named Artistic Director Emeritus along with Carmon DeLeone who was named Music Director Emeritus, having directed CB’s music for five decades; both lifetime appointments.
