Nacho Duato

Nacho Duato, born in Valencia, Spain, began his professional ballet training at the age of 18 at the Rambert School in London. He continued at Maurice Béjart's Mudra School in Brussels and completed his studies at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Center in New York. Nacho Duato signed his first engagement with the Cullberg Ballet in Stockholm in 1980, and a year later Jiří Kylián brought him to the Nederlands Dans Theater. In recognition of his achievements as a dancer, Nacho Duato received the Golden Dance Award in Schouwburgen in the Netherlands in 1987. He became interested in choreography very early and his very first creation in 1983 was a great success: "Jardí Tancat" to Catalan music by Maria del Mar Bonet was awarded first prize at the International Choreography Workshop in Cologne. In 1988 Nacho Duato was appointed permanent choreographer at the Nederlands Dans Theater together with Hans van Manen and Jiří Kylián. Appointed by the Instituto Nacional de Artes Escénicas y de la Música of the Spanish Ministry of Culture, Nacho Duato was artistic director of the Compañía Nacional de Danza from June 1990. In 1995, Nacho Duato received the title "Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres", which is awarded annually by the French Embassy in Spain. In 1998, the Spanish government awarded him the Gold Medal for his services to the fine arts. In April 2000, he won the prestigious Prix Benois de la Danse for "Multiplicity. Forms of Silence and Emptiness". In 2003, Nacho Duato was the winner of the Spanish Dance Prize in the category "Creativity". After 20 years as artistic director of the Compañía Nacional de Danza in Madrid, Nacho Duato took over the direction of the ballet of the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St. Petersburg in 2011. From the 2014/15 season he became artistic director of the Berlin State Ballet for four years. Since 2018, he has again been artistic director of the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St. Petersburg. He provided the Nuremberg Ballet with his works "Duende" (2011) and "Por vos muero (2014).

Photo © Charles Thompson