Iris Lahad was born in 1960 in Israel.
She started studying ballet at age seven. In 1970, at aged ten, she relocated to the US with her family and continued her ballet training at The Washington School of Ballet. In 1974, she returned with her family to Israel and settled in Haifa. She continued her dance training at the Carmel Dance Center. In 1976-79 she danced with the Israeli Ballet Company. In 1981 she was admitted, first to Batsheva 2 under Nira Paaz’s artistic direction, and several months later to Batsheva under Moshe Romano’s artistic direction. Lahad danced in the following Batsheva works: Living Games, Shadows of Blues, Testimony, Passages (1981); Ocean Sounds, The Foreigner, Transformation (1982); Inostress, This Sky, This Land, Touches, Night Grief, The Lost (1983).
In 1990 Lahad retired from dancing and accepted Ohad Naharin’s proposal to create a junior company, Batsheva Ensemble, and serve as its artistic director. Lahad held this position in 1990-93. The Ensemble’s first repertoire was borrowed from Batsheva Company’s repertoire and it performed with it in all morning shows throughout the country. During those years, Lahad formed the Ensemble into a coordinated team and developed its artistic and organizational infrastructure. Prior to her retirement in 1993, the Batsheva Company and Ensemble performed jointly in Naharin’s Anaphase.
Between 1994 and 1996 Lahad lived in China with her family and acquired expertise in Tai Chi and Qigong. Upon her return to Israel she began teaching these arts to groups and individuals, worked in physical and energetic healing and facilitated meditation and awareness workshops. She also taught ballet in various dance centers.
Today, Lahad provides workshops, courses and individual coaching, and works with a variety of populations, including children, youth, adults and the elderly.
