Emily Karnes is an accomplished artist and teacher with significant education and experience in dance. She received her early classical ballet training with Rebecca Miller Stalcup, Dennis Poole, Mark Bush, Melinda Tobian, and Laura Hood Babcock, at Arkansas Academy of Dance. She has also attended intensive programs at the Joffrey Ballet and with Doug Varone and Dancers. Ms. Karnes holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Dance from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, where she studied closely with Slavin-Nadal School of Ballet Director, Joseph Cox, as well as Nancy Happel, Rhythm McCarthy, Stephanie Thibeault, and Stephen Stone. In addition to dance technique and performance, her studies included dance pedagogy, dance history, movement analysis, and choreography. In recognition of her academic and artistic excellence, Ms. Karnes was awarded a full scholarship to study dance at the Accademia dell’Arte in Arezzo, Italy in 2012.

Ms. Karnes was an instructor at Arkansas Academy of Dance for five years, where she taught all youth levels of ballet. She was also a resident company member of the affiliated Arkansas Festival Ballet for eight years, performing a number of roles including Dew Drop Fairy, Clara, Sugar Plum Fairy, and Grand Pas De Deux in The Nutcracker, as well as Alice in Alice in Wonderland, Princess Aurora in Sleeping Beauty, and Tinker Bell in Peter Pan. Her local performance credits include performing with Lisa Nicks’ Band of Wild Ponies, and she is a current performing member of Shakti Moves Dance Company, under the direction of Erica Santiago. Prior to joining the staff at Dancers Workshop, she directed the youth department and instructed many adult classes at Slavin Nadal School of Ballet and Capital City Ballet.