NANCY HENDEREK is the visionary Producer, Director, and Founder of the internationally acclaimed Dance Salad Festival, a curated celebration of international dance that she first imagined and launched in Brussels in 1992. Henderek produced, directed, and co-choreographed the festival’s first three productions in Belgium before bringing the event to Houston.

Dance Salad Festival became Henderek’s signature artistic legacy—a project “born in Brussels that grew up in Houston.” In 2022, the festival celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary in Houston and twenty-eighth overall, returning after the global pandemic of 2020 and 2021. It brought Houston audiences masterful dancers, choreographers, and live musicians from around the world. Dance Salad Festival grew into one of the city’s most anticipated annual arts presentations.

Born in Washington, D.C., Henderek’s lifelong relationship with dance began in childhood ballet classes which continued throughout her life. Her love of dance nurtured the creative energy that would eventually shape her career. She has since danced and choreographed in Sweden, Brussels, Houston and Hong Kong. In Sweden, she performed with the Marchant Dance Theater in Gothenburg under Claude Marchant, one of the original dancers of the Katherine Dunham Company.

Nancy’s years in Brussels were formative, both as a Resident Choreographer at the International School of Brussels—where she taught dance and helped build a thriving high school dance and theater program—and as a freelance choreographer for the Brussels Shakespeare Festival, the Operettentheater Nouveau Théâtre de Belgique, and the American Theatre Company. Her work in Houston included performing with the Houston Grand Opera and teaching dance at Episcopal High School and Houston Community College.

Henderek is celebrated for her unparalleled ability to cast the net globally for exceptional dance companies. Guided by her deep experience and discerning artistic eye, Nancy curated each Dance Salad season, together with the choreographers chosen, with a distinctive sensibility for beauty, craft, and musicality. Her contributions include not only selecting choreography, but also working directly with the artists to adapt and refine pieces specifically for the Houston stage.

A lifelong creative spirit with a passion cultivated since childhood—when she crafted neighborhood performances using her sister and friends together with a barrel of old costumes provided by her mother—Nancy Henderek has elevated the dance world through her dedication, vision, and curatorial expertise.