Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre (LNOBT) ballet troupe's artistic director will be the ballerina Jurgita Dronina from January 15, and Martynas Rimeikis, who has been the director until now, will become the theater's chief choreographer.
"The well-known prima ballerina Jurgita Dronina will dance her last performances on our stage as a ballet artist this week. (...) From January 15, she starts in our theater in a new position and becomes the artistic director of the ballet troupe of the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre," LNOBT general director Laima Vilimienė announced during the press conference on Monday.
"Martynas Rimeikis, who firmly holds the helm of the position of artistic director of the ballet troupe, becomes the chief choreographer of the theater from January 15," said the director.
J. Dronina is a ballet artist, prima ballerina of the Royal Swedish Theatre, the national ballets of the Netherlands, Canada and England, and an international guest ballerina in many countries around the world.
The dancer was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Order "For Services to Lithuania" in 2018, and she was awarded the Baltic Assembly Prize in the same year.
"I am proudly returning to my homeland, bringing my twenty years of experience, knowledge, vision and ambitions to the Lithuanian National Theater Troupe," said J. Dronina.
"I was awarded the Knight's Cross of the State Order "For Services to Lithuania" for promoting the name of Lithuania in the world, while living and creating abroad, I will always have a great motivation to continue to persistently contribute to the development and formation of Lithuanian culture, ballet history and the ballet troupe, only in this case no longer living abroad, and when at home, here in Lithuania", said the future artistic director of the ballet troupe.
From 2020 until now, ballet artist and choreographer M. Rimeikis held this position, he will now take the position of chief choreographer.
Mr. Rimeikis said that he is not leaving the troupe and hopes that he will be able to continue to help go in the jointly created direction, to cooperate closely with Mr. Dronina.
"All the time, I had the desire to leave the troupe in the highest possible position for the next, incoming manager, so that it could go even further." I hope it was successful", said M. Rimeikis.
Celebrating the centenary of Lithuanian ballet
According to L. Vilimienė, the troupe starts the new year with a "powerful" reinforcement and big, ambitious plans to raise the artistic quality of the theater even higher, to push into the world.
This year also marks the centenary of ballet in Lithuania, and a special program is planned for that occasion.
"The program is being developed and we have planned a lot of events in that program," said L. Vilimienė.
According to the director of the theater, the program will be presented later, but revealed that the culmination of the century of ballet will be the performance staged by M. Rimeikis.
"The culmination of it (ballet century program - BNS) will be the premiere on December 4 of this year. This is precisely the play "Kopelija" created by M. Rimeikis, its modern version," said L. Vilimienė.
The author is Karolina Ambrazaitytė
