Opening Night Of Stephen Mills’ “In Motion: Three Celebrated Dances” At Long Center.

Don’t miss opening night as Ballet Austin spotlights Stephen Mills’ In Motion / Three Celebrated Dances—a powerful, retrospective program in which Mills shares “three deeply personal and celebrated dance works that explore transformation, resilience, and celebration.” The evening brings together The Pink Confetti Dance, Four Mortal Men, and Liminal Glam, offering audiences a journey “from exuberant joy to emotional depth and bold theatrical flair” . Opening night is designed as “a luminous evening of dance, artistry, and celebration,” marking Mills’ extraordinary 25-year creative legacy with Ballet Austin.

Here’s what to expect from the three dances:

• The Pink Confetti Dance: A burst of pure joy — and deliberately so. Mills calls The Pink Confetti Dance “a very fun piece… filled with fun and laughter and joy,” inspired by an Art Basel exhibition of oversized confetti totems. Watching “eight dancers running around the stage throwing pink confetti at each other,” he says, “couldn’t get more fun than that.” Mills promises audiences will leave smiling: “At the end… people are going to leave with a smile. That’s just all there is to it.”

• Four Mortal Men: Mills describes Four Mortal Men as “certainly my very, most personal work” — a dance rooted in memory, grief, and survival. Created as part of his 25th anniversary season, the piece reflects what he has “felt and shared with the audience over that period of time,” drawing from his experiences during the early AIDS crisis. “Courage isn’t an absence of fear,” Mills says. “It is action, in the face of fear.” What he hopes audiences take away is simple and profound: “we all have loss in our lives, and we all deserve caring and support and love in those very difficult moments.”

• Liminal Glam: One of Mills’ personal favorites, Liminal Glam lives in the space “between” — “neither a classical ballet, nor… a modern ballet,” but something that “draws on the best parts of each.” Set to a score by “my all-time favorite composer, Philip Glass,” the work pulses with energy, confidence, and visual boldness. The “glam” comes from “the way the dancers look, the way they show themselves, the environment they’re in.” Mills hopes audiences leave still “vibrating with that beautiful pulse of that Philip Glass music — and the pride with which the dancers show themselves.”

Meet Stephen Mills: Stephen Mills, Ballet Austin’s artistic director, known as “the consummate artist and leader” and “an empowerer of artists,” has created over 60 premieres for the company and works performed worldwide. His Hamlet was hailed as “sleek and sophisticated” by Dance Magazine, while The Washington Post called Ballet Austin “one of the nation’s best kept ballet secrets” with ballets in repertoires from Hong Kong to Havana.

When: Friday, February 13 (opening night!) 7:30 PM | Where: Long Center’s Dell Hall | Tickets: Here.

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