Nino Ananiashvili

Ananiashvili in Swan Lake

Nino Ananiashvili ( Georgian ნინო ანანიაშვილი ; Russian Нина Гедевановна Ананиашвили / Nina Gedewanovna Ananiashvili ; born March 28, 1963 in Tbilisi ) is a Georgian prima ballerina . She became an international superstar at the Moscow Bolshoi Theater . Since September 2004 she has been artistic director of the Georgian National Ballet .

Life

She comes from a Georgian aristocratic family , is the daughter of a geologist and a linguist. Because she was a sickly child, she started skating when she was four. In 1973 she became Georgian youth figure skating champion, but then switched to ballet.

At the State School for Choreography of Georgia she studied with Tamara Wichodzewa and Wachtang Tschabukiani . In 1976 she entered the Choreographic Institute , the School of the Moscow Bolshoi Ballet . Her teacher there was Natalia Viktorovna Zolotova. In 1980 she won the junior gold medal at the Varna International Competition (Bulgaria) and the Grand Prize at the Moscow Ballet Competition.

After graduating from school in 1981, she was accepted into the Bolshoi Ballet. She had her first major appearance in 1982 as Princess Odette-Odile in Schwanensee during the ballet tour in Germany . She soon earned one of the first places in the ensemble, dancing prima ballerina roles in Giselle , Sleeping Beauty , Don Quichotte , La Bayadère , Raimonda , The Nutcracker and Romeo and Juliet . In 1985 she again won the gold medal at the Moscow Ballet Competition, and in 1986 the Grand Prix of the International Ballet Competition in Jackson , Mississippi .

After a tour with the Bolshoi Ballet to Great Britain (1986) and through the United States (1987), which was highly praised by the public and critics, she invited the New York City Ballet to a guest performance in 1988 with her partner Andris Liepa as the first Soviet dancer.

Since then, Ananiashvili has been considered a ballet superstar. In addition to her engagement in Moscow, she became the first dancer of the American Ballet Theater (ABT) , performed with the Royal Danish Ballet , the Kirov Ballet , the Covent Garden Ballet , the Royal Swedish Ballet , the Ballet of Monte Carlo , the National Ballet of Norway , Finland and Portugal , as well as with the dance ensembles of Birmingham , Boston , Munich , Houston and Tokyo . In the 1990s she founded her own ensemble, the Nina Ananiashvili and International Stars .

In 2001 she celebrated her 20th stage anniversary at the Bolshoi Theater. In September 2004 she followed the call of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili and initially took on the artistic direction of the Georgian National Ballet in Tbilisi for three years . In December 2004 her first production, a trilogy of one-act plays, premiered in Tbilisi. The focus of the repertoire should be on classical dance but also on modern performances.

In 1991 Aniashvili was the first dancer to be awarded the Russian State Prize Triumph , and in 1993 the Schota Rustaveli State Prize of Georgia. In 2000, she appointed the International Biographical Institute for Woman of the Year .

Since 2005 she has been a member of the Georgian Public Broadcasting Board .

Private

Since 1988 she has been married to the politician Grigol Vashadze , Georgia's Foreign Minister from 2008 to 2012. In November 2006, Ananiashvili became the godmother of President Saakashvili's youngest son, Nikolos.

Videos

• Nina Ananiashvili, Aleksei Fadeyetchev with State Perm Ballet: Don Quixote . VHS (NTSC format), Kultur Video, 1993
• Nina Ananiashvili, Aleksei Fadeyetchev with State Perm Ballet: Swan Lake . VHS (NTSC format), Kultur Video, 1993
• Nina Ananiashvili and International Stars: Vol. 1 . VHS (NTSC format), Video Artists Inter., 1994
• Nina Ananiashvili and International Stars: Vol. 2 . VHS (NTSC format), Video Artists Inter., 1994
• Nina Ananiashvili and International Stars: Vol. 3 . VHS (NTSC format), Video Artists Inter., 1994
• Nina Ananiashvili and International Stars: Vol. 4 . VHS (NTSC format), Video Artists Inter., 1994
• Nina Ananiashvili and the International All-Stars of Dance: Vol. 1 . DVD (Region 1), Video Arts International, 2003
• Nina Ananiashvili and the International All-Stars of Dance: Vol. 2 . DVD (Region 1), Video Arts InY

Web links

Commons : Nino Ananiashvili  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Los Angeles Times Magazine: A Swan Takes Flight , June 21, 2000
• Fansite for Nino Ananiaschwili
• Nino Ananiashvili at the Bolshoi Theater (Russian)
• Nino Ananiaschwili at the American Ballet Theater (English)
• Nino Ananiashvili at the Georgian National Ballet (English)