Raised on a dairy farm in Vermont, he took a dance class during his freshman year at Dartmouth College after an injury interrupted the early days of his college ski career. He had aspirations to ski in the Olympics, but instead found a way to translate the discipline and athleticism to a new medium.

Pendleton is now a world-renowned choreographer who has worked with organizations and artists around the world, from the Joffrey Ballet in Chicago to the Paris Opera, in addition to works for television and film. MOMIX, the “dance-illusionist” company that he founded and directs, is in town this weekend for one show on Saturday, Aug. 2 at 8 p.m.

This is not Pendleton’s first time in Lake Placid. He was here with Pilobolus, the dance company he co-founded at Dartmouth, to perform during the 1980 Olympic Winter Games. It fell to him to choreograph as segment for the closing ceremony.

During those games, he was working with limited rehearsal time, a relatively low-tech set up, and the challenge of choreographing on ice. The tribute was set to the music of Beethoven’s ninth symphony, the “Ode to Joy,” which is popularly taken to symbolize humanity and brotherhood. He arranged more than 100 young ice skaters into a ball, meant to represent the globe, and the dancers peeled away to reveal one little girl. Pendleton still remembers her name — Melissa, who was just learning how to skate.

The performance didn’t exactly go as planned. There was some sort of delay, and the girl had to lie down under a pile of skaters for longer than expected, which melted some of the ice underneath her.

“As they peeled away, she slowly got up, but she was just trembling and shaking, and it was an indelible image of the newborn calf, bringing new life into the world,” Pendleton said. “So it was quite effective, quite poetic — and a good accident. I hope she didn’t catch cold from it.”

That same year, Pendleton broke off from Pilobolus to form his own company. He carried over many of the same aesthetic approaches — using human bodies as sculptural material to create imaginative shapes and illusions. With MOMIX, he started to incorporate more props, but kept the same emphasis on athleticism, with some pieces directly inspired by sports.

“There is that connection to dance and to athletics in terms of the expression and the power of the body in order to move people and inspire people,” he said.

This weekend’s show is called, VIVA MOMIX, and it’s a “compilation album” with highlights from the company’s other full length shows. Pendleton hopes the show will provide a bit of an imaginative escape.

“It’s athletic and humorous and strange and metamorphic and surreal and really entertaining,” he said.

“I think it does paint a picture of how the world might be in a fantasy rather than what we get on the front pages of the newspaper.”

Saturday’s show will be in the Lake Placid Center for the Arts auditorium at 17 Algonquin Dr. Tickets cost $32 in advance and $37 at the door, and can be bought online at lakeplacidarts.org or by calling the box office at 518-523-2512.