Reviews

"She’s a performer inside and outside, from a piercing gaze to expressive shoulder blades and from the coils of her long black hair to her finger tips and toes. " -- danceviewtimes

"She is a fierce and supple performer..." --The New York Times

"Yatkin’s impeccable execution and her inventive choreography transform the myth of Mata Hari into a creature who was victim of circumstances..." -- El Heraldo Nuevo

"Mata Hari's life.made Yatkin question herself so that the new (De/Re)constructing Mata Hari became a dual portrait of the two women with Yatkin playing both roles. " -- Dance Magazine

"Nejla Yatkin is a powerful, arresting figure onstage, a leading dancer on the local scene who performs increasingly all over the world." --The Washington Times

"Before a full house Sunday at Dance Place, Nejla Y. Yatkin's show was innovative in both form and content." --The Washington Post

"Choreographically Yatkin used the entire stage as she created her luminous images, framed in dramatic clarity and passion." --New York Times Journal

"In her five-year retrospective Yatkin danced three of her own solos, her dancing and conceptual designs broad enough to encompass juxtapositions and multiple characters."--Washington Post

"Nejla Yatkin brings to the stage an exotic air, an erotic note and an artistic intellect that's stiletto sharp."--George Jackson

"'Echoes' is not a complex work, but it demonstrates the possibilities of Yatkin's visual and choreographic sensibilities. She has a sharp eye for designed elements, an introspective soul and exceptional technical capabilities." --Lisa Traiger

"Ms. Yatkin is a serious artist who tackles important themes in a way that is highly intellectual but always vividly provocative and dramatic."--Washington Times

"Each of the three works -- one by modern dance legend Jose Limon, two by Yatkin -- was a multilayered experience, and together they left a lasting impression of a woman with a distinctive voice in firm control of her art. " --Washington Post

"Whether she nested on the ground, arms undulating swan-like on the cushion of her black tulle skirt, or stood up to step out of that skirt into freedom, each motion was drawn slowly, carefully, deliberately. " --Danceview Times

"Her body floats as lightly as her skirt, but what is most extraordinary are the muscular strength, steely focus and precision underlying the loveliness...... " --Washington Post

"....Given current events it was the Americans, not surprisingly, who caught the eye with their statement dances. Nejla Yatkin's "After" was a ravishing soloreflecting on the aftermath of 9/11. A magnificent fusion of dance, video and text fragments, Washington-based Yatkin's metaphor was a line of empty shoes, and when she added her own to the line, and faded back into the darkness, it was a profoundly moving moment........"--Paula Citron, the Globe and Mail, Toronto

"Nejla Yatkin's promising choreography displayed in her Saturday Dance Place show 'Gravity' proved why she's quickly gained a place in Washington dance... " --Washington Post

"The developing D.C.-based choreographer pulls from a rich accumulation of dance tradition: from Turkish folk dance to classic American modern forms, including the Martha Graham and Jose Limon techniques, to the expressionistic modern dance tradition of Germany and the apocalyptic theatricality of Japanese butoh."--Washington Post

"Ms. Yatkin has arms and legs that seem to defy nature with their detailed expressiveness" --Play DC

"I feel alive when I dance,' Yatkin said. 'Every time I perform, I learn more about the dance, the audience, myself.'" --The Alexandria Journal