(CNN)Gregg Delman had never heard of ballet dancer Misty Copeland before spotting her in a magazine in 2011.
His experience with ballet, limited to sitting through “The Nutcracker” as a child, meant he had no idea that she was one of the world’s most celebrated talents.
She would go on to make history in 2015, when she became the prestigious American Ballet Theatre’s first black female principal dancer.
“A photographer who understands how to memorialize a moment in a dancer’s journey has a gift, and it is a gift to work with them,” Copeland writes in the book’s foreword.
“Gregg Delman has been a unique audience, yet a subtly creative participant, both inviting and warm; he has that rare gift of capturing movement.”
Check out the gallery above to see Gregg Delman’s most beautiful photos of Misty Copeland.
Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/27/arts/misty-copeland-gregg-delman/index.html