Barak Marshall

Barak Marshall was born in 1968 in Los Angeles.

He is the son of Margalit Oved, dancer, choreographer and musician, and one of the founding members of Inbal Dance Theater, and to Melvin Marshall. Barak Marshall arrived in Israel for the first time upon graduating from high school in order to study Hebrew in a kibbutz. He returned to the US in order to study in UCLA, where he spent two years before moving to Harvard to complete his BA in social sciences. In 1994, he immigrated to Israel with his mother following her appointment as Inbal’s artistic director. That year, his aunt Leah passed away, and as a gesture of mourning he began dancing, despite having no previous personal experience. The mourning process led to his first choreography, Aunt Leah (1995), which won first prize at the Shades of Dance (Gvanim Bemachol) Festival. Later on, in Curtain UP (Haramat Masach), he staged The Land of Sad Oranges (1997), Shoshana’s Balcony, Zion, Emma Goldman’s Wedding (1998).

After a tour of his dances in Europe he was commissioned by Ohad Naharin to choreograph And When the Rooster Crowed the Green Bride Floated through the Village Square (2000) for Batsheva. In 2001 he retired due to a traffic accident which required him to spend two years rehabilitating in a US hospital. In the following years, he was active mainly as a musician and sang with various ensembles in LA. He performed with the Los Angeles Jewish Symphony, with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, with the Yuval Ron Ensemble and the cellist Yo-Yo Ma.
In the late 2000s, Marshall returned to Israel and choreographed Monger (2008) and Rooster (2009), both for the Tel Aviv Dance Festival, as well as Wonderland produced by the Suzanne Dellal Center. Following his recent success, he was commissioned to choreograph original pieces for Rambert Dance Company, Les Ballets Jazz de Montréal, and Cisne Negro (Black Swan) of São Paulo.
In 2014, Marshall was made artistic director of Inbal Dance Theater and Ethnic Center.
Marshal won first prize at Shades of Dance (Gvanim Bemachol) Festival (1995), Bagnolet Award (1998), Bonnie Bird Award and the French ADAMI Award (1998), Lester Horton Award (2010), and an award by the Joyce Foundation (2010).