Modern dancer, ballet dancer, choreographer, dance researcher, model

ABOUT DELEISE

Deleise is a Utah native. Growing up in a family of artists, She has been very lucky to explore several different art forms including modeling, opera singing, and oil painting. In addition to these different art forms, She has a strong Scottish heritage and began training and competing in Scottish Highland Dance at the age of 4. Deleise did not always have the opportunity to explore other dance mediums, and it wasn’t until she moved out at the age of 18 when she enrolled in a ballet class at a small studio. This ballet class led to Deleise studying Ballet and Modern dance at Utah Valley University. She has had many performance opportunities in Utah valley at school and local venues. She has performed with Utah Regional Ballet in The Nutcracker, and prior to that she was also involved in the Celebrated Voices event as well as several student choreographic projects. Deleise most recently performed in Oquirrh Mountain Ballet's production of The Nutcracker, and also in the UVU 2016 Capstone concert, “Insight.”  Deleise also recently completed a choreography project for her senior capstone entitled, “Perpendicular Minds.”

In addition to dance, Deleise also enjoys studying philosophy and history. She has applied these interests to dance resulting in an interdisciplinary research project which was submitted and accepted for National Conference of Undergraduate Research 2015 where she presented her research, “A Critical Analysis of Petite Mort by Jiří Kylián” from a structuralist/semiotics perspective. Her work explores how Kylián challenges views of sexuality and ritual as an artistic expression of the human body. After graduating, Deleise hopes to continue choreographing and dancing.