Christopher House is one of Canada’s most respected dance artists. Born and raised in St. John’s, Newfoundland, he joined TDT as a dancer in 1979, was named Resident Choreographer in 1981 and became Artistic Director in 1994. 

Christopher House has contributed over sixty works to the TDT repertoire including Glass Houses, Four Towers, Early Departures, Vena Cava and Chiasmata. He has created works for Lisbon’s Ballet Gulbenkian, the National Ballet of Canada, Les Grands Ballets Canadiens and Ballet British Columbia, among others, and directed two collaborations with Joel Gibb and The Hidden Cameras and directed several short films and videos. His most recent choreographies include  Pteros Tactics (2010), the “annotated remount” Nest Redux (2010) and Rivers,  all for Toronto Dance Theatre. Rivers, performed to the celebrated score of the same name by Ann Southam, premiered in April 2012 in Toronto with live music by Christina Petrowska Quilico and set design by Michael Levine, and was subsequently performed at the Canada Dance Festival at the National Arts Centre, Ottawa.  

As a performer, House has created roles in works by Sarah Chase, Peter Chin, David Earle, Mark Morris, James Kudelka and Peter Randazzo, and often appeared in his own works. While a guest with Les Grand Ballets Canadiens, he performed the title role in Michel Fokine’s Petrouchka, in Kudelka’s In Paradisum and in Nijinska’s Les Noces as well as in his solo Schubert Dances at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. 

Christopher House has participated three times as a dancer in the Solo Performance Commissioning Project with Deborah Hay in Findhorn, Scotland. He premiered his adaptation of News by Deborah Hay in December 2006, and presented five performances of this solo at the Canada Dance Festival in June 2008. He performed his adaptation of Hay’s At Once in London and Brighton, UK, in early December, 2011. 

Artistic Advisor of the Professional Training Program of The School of Toronto Dance Theatre, House has taught technique, improvisation, mindful performance and creative process at The School of TDT and at such institutions as the Juilliard School, Rotterdam Dansacademie, Jacob’s Pillow, and at Ryerson, Simon Fraser and York Universities. 

 He has received many awards for his work, including three Dora Mavor Moore Awards for Outstanding New Choreography. He received the Muriel Sherrin Award for International Achievement in Dance in October 2009, was made an honorary doctor of letters by Memorial University in 2010, and received the Toronto Alliance for Performing Arts Silver Ticket Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Arts in 2012. 

Christopher House is an Associate Dance Artist of Canada’s National Arts Centre.