Jurgita
Dronina

Benois de la Danse nominee

Jurgita Dronina was born in Russia in 1986 and graduated from the ballet
school at the National M. K. Čiurlionis School of Art in Vilnius, Lithuania.
She continued her training at the Munich International BalletAcademy under the directorship Konstanze Vernon.

Dronina joined the Royal Swedish Ballet in 2005 and was promoted to
Principal dancer in 2008.She was Principal ballerina at the Dutch National Ballet from 2010 to 2015and then joined the National Ballet of Canada. Two years later Dronina left to become Lead Principal ballerina with the English National Ballet. She was Guest Principal artist with the Hong Kong Ballet from 2015-2017.

Droninais currently Principal ballerina with two companies: the National Ballet
of Canada and the English National Ballet.

Her repertoire includes Nykia in La Bayadère; Aurora in Sleeping Beauty; Juliet in Romeo and Juliet; Giselle in Giselle; Odette/Odile in Swan Lake; La Sylphide in La Sylphide; Kitri in Don Quixote; Olga in Onegin; Sylvia in Sylvia; Manon in La Dame Aux Camellias; Blanche Dubois in A Streetcar Named Desire; Medora in Le Corsaire; Esmeralda in Notre-Dame de Paris; Swanilda in Coppelia; Queen Sofia Magdalena in Gustav III; Hermoine in The Winter’s Tale; and Olga in On The Dnieper and Firebird.

Dronina has danced in ballets by many luminaries of choreography including George Balanchine, Wayne Eagling, James Kudelka, Terence Kohler, Christopher Wheeldon, Frederick Ashton, Krzysztof Pastor, Kenneth MacMillan, William Forsyth, Mauro Bigonzetti, Christian Spuck, Nils Christe, and Jean-Christophe Maillot.

Her guest appearances include the Arena Di Verona, Norwegian National Ballet, Het Nationale Ballet, Royal Danish Ballet, Rudolf Nureyev International Ballet Festival in Kazan, Russia, Teatro San Carlo, Hong Kong Ballet, Lithuanian National Ballet, Shanghai Ballet, and Opera dell Roma.

Dronina has been honored with many awards, including the Rotary International award (2008); a Swedish-Danish cultural grant awarded by Danish Queen Margrethe IIof Denmark (2009); awards from the International Ballet Festival ‘Dance Open’ in St.Petersburg in 2010, 2011 and 2013; Outstanding Dancer award from the European Dance Magazine “Dance Europe” in several seasons; the Zwaan Best Performance of 2011 Award for the role ofAurora in Sleeping Beauty; and the Alexandra Radius Award in 2014 for Outstanding Dancer of the Year.