Damian Woetzel celebrates 20 years as Vail Dance Festival’s artistic director

Damian Woetzel celebrates 20 years as Vail Dance Festival’s artistic director

When Damian Woetzel first came to Vail in 1993 as a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet to perform George Balanchine’s “Stars and Stripes,” he had traveled all over the world. But the Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater stood out to him amongst other venues, in part due to its outdoor setting. “That sense of nature that I first experienced — there’s really nothing quite like it, when you see the moon (rising over) the Rocky Mountains and smel…