Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater announced Thursday that Jamar Roberts has been selected to be the company’s first ever resident choreographer. Mr. Roberts, a veteran company member, will begin his tenure with “Ode,” an examination of the value of life in an era of pervasive gun violence. The work for six dancers will debut on Dec. 10 as a part of the company’s five-week season at New York City Center.

Mr. Roberts did a widely acclaimed piece, “Members Don’t Get Weary,” for Ailey, in 2017. “All of the sudden you make a great piece and everybody wants you,” Robert Battle, the troupe’s artistic director, said in an interview. “Then you have to start to reinvent that same piece because sometimes you’re being asked to do that.” Mr. Battle said that as an in-house choreographer, Mr. Roberts would have the opportunity “to continue to investigate his voice.”

In addition to choreographing “Ode,” the first of a planned three-part series of dances, Mr. Roberts will design the costumes.

Donald Byrd’s “Greenwood,” his fifth work for Ailey, shares Mr. Roberts’s political focus. The ensemble piece, set to debut on Dec. 6, is inspired by the 1921 Tulsa Riots, in which white residents terrorized their black neighbors. “As we’ve just celebrated our 60th anniversary, we’re looking at ways Alvin Ailey used his voice as a weapon for change,” Mr. Battle said.