Stephanie Ellison turned an early dance intervention to correct pigeon-toed feet and scoliosis into a lifelong passion for movement and connection. With a B.A. in Communications from Illinois State University, concentrating in Japanese and Political Science, her diverse career has included on-air news and jazz programming for NPR in Illinois and public relations for the food and restaurant industry in San Francisco and Los Angeles.
Returning to movement practices in 2001, Stephanie earned her Pilates Certification from Performing Arts Physical Therapy and The Pilates Studio of LA, and later trained under Romana Kryzanowska, Joseph Pilates’ protégé, while teaching at Winsor Pilates in West Hollywood. She expanded her practice into circus arts, integrating play with health and wellness. This led to the opening of a Pilates practice with Bumbershoot Aerial Arts in St. Louis and contributions to the Dance Department at Washington University. Her teaching has extended across the U.S. and internationally, including at Rhinebeck Pilates in New York, and in Norway, France, England, and China.
Stephanie’s ongoing studies in Tai Chi (under Frøde Strand Karlsen and Paul Wirth), dance, and somatic awareness (with Mary Bond, Caryn McHose, Andrea Olsen, and Hubert Godard) inform her evolving practice. In 2023, she completed her master’s with Choreomundus, an Erasmus Mundus program that explores dance and movement systems as intangible cultural heritage. Her anthropology fieldwork considered ritual movement and dance in relation to local environments and community in Southern England.
Currently a guest researcher at the Interacting Minds Centre at Aarhus University in Denmark, Stephanie's interdisciplinary research explores a theory of Rhythm through embodiment, sensory experience, spatial phenomenology, and anthropology, applying this to frameworks for joint action in education, healthcare, environmental awareness, and community, focusing on how perceptual rhythms shape human relationships and institutional structures.
CV here.
Some art projects TheRustedWrench.com