“haunting, hallucinatory, and profoundly intimate” – VOGUE

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Tom Pearson’s multimedia work—in dance, theater, film, art, and poetry—combines material culture and audience-centered narratives using ritual and performance to investigate identity and belonging, loss and reclamation, exile and refuge. His mixed-media projects are often site-specific, immersive, and interactive, and he frequently collaborates in-community with other artists. His dense and evocative poetry offers surreal and frequently haunting imagery that has been described as both “vastly panoramic and deeply personal,” and his critically-acclaimed works for theater have been lauded for their ability to craft “dreamscape[s] where the judgments and classifications of the waking mind are inoperative, and where the single self keeps splitting and blurring” (Ben Brantley, The New York Times).

Performance

“Exacting, exuberant choreography” – The New York Times

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Performance Highlights

Yours to Lose (2024), South by Southwest, Austin

UN-[TITLED] (2023), On the Boards, Seattle

Ikaros (2019), La Jolla Playhouse, San Diego

Confection (2019), Folger Shakespeare Library, DC

As Time Goes By (2016), St. Petersburg, Russia

The Grand Paradise (2016), Brooklyn

Then She Fell (2012-2020), Brooklyn

Vanishing Point (2008), Danspace Project, NY

Scroll to bottom for more performance works and other projects.

Poetry

“Above all, Pearson demonstrates a mastery of imagery.”

— Publisher’s Weekly

Published Works

New poems coming in 2025, slated for publication in The Arlington Literary Journal (Feb.) and Alocaisia (June). After publication, new poems also appear in Writings. Below are full-length works, currently available.

Still, the Sky (2023) | Audio Book at Audible and iTunes

Eppure il Cielo (2023) | Interno Poesia Editore, Italy

Still, the Sky (2022) | Ransom Poet Publishers, New York

The Sandpiper's Spell (2018) | Ransom Poet Publishers, New York

About Tom

“Wildly imaginative” – The New Yorker

Tom Pearson (he/they) is an award-winning, American multimedia theater artist, choreographer, and poet. Tom is founder and co-artistic director of the New York City-based performance company, Third Rail Projects, co-creator of its long-running off-Broadway hits, Then She Fell and The Grand Paradise, and director for the Global Performance Studio, a program for cultural listening and exchange. Tom holds a Master of Arts degree in Performance Studies from New York University. He has been noted for his “exacting, exuberant choreography” and for his “vastly panoramic and deeply personal” poetry. Read More…

VISUAL ART

“Mesmeric and enveloping… stunning visual multimedia”

— Kirkus Reviews

Exhibition Highlights

The Archives of Asterion (2020) | Olin College of Engineering

Stanzas (2019) | Ace Hotel New York

Agave Trio (2022) | at Studio 80 + Sculpture Grounds

Kissing the Gunner's Daughter (2010) | DNA Gallery, New York

GPS/X

“a true cross-cultural exchange” – Susan Katz, CEC ArtsLink

Global Performance Studio / eXchange

A Program for Cultural Listening & Exchange + Process & Performance

The Global Performance Studio & eXchange, led by Tom Pearson, is dedicated to creating work through collaboration, sharing the site-specific and experiential performances practices of Third Rail Projects, and engaging with communities around the world. GPS/X cultivates opportunities to foster diplomacy through shared practice, dialogue, and community building, all within a framework of cultural listening and peer-to-peer artist exchange. To-date, GPS/X has worked with artists in the United States, Hong Kong, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Germany, Italy, and Russia. Learn More…