Alexandra Timofeeva and Mikhail Martyniuk The Sleeping Beauty pdd

Alexandra Timofeeva as Princess Aurora and Mikhail Martyniuk as Prince Desiree (both with Kremlin Ballet Theatre) in The Sleeping Beauty grand Pas de Deux. Birgitta Festival 2013.

Alexandra Timofeeva (Rus Александра Тимофеева) was invited to the Kremlin Ballet in 2000 at the end of the Moscow State Academy of Choreography (class M.V Mikhailova). Today Aleksandra is Prima Ballerina at Kremlin Ballet Theatre and Honored Artist of Russia (2010).

Mikhail Martyniuk graduated from Perm State Ballet School in the class of V.J. Alikina. Joined the “Kremlin Ballet” in 2003. Mikhail is awarded the prize for best performance of contemporary dance at the Open Russian Ballet Competition “Arabesque” (2002) and the Youth Award “Triumph” (2005). Martynuk winner of the All-Russian Ballet Competition in Krasnodar (2004), the student of the Open Competition of Russian Ballet “Arabesque” (2006), winner of the first prize and gold medal at the I International Ballet Competition in Astana (Kazakhstan). He participated in the ballet festivals in Yakutsk, Kazan, Nizhny Novgorod. His permanent teacher is Vadim Kremensky.

The Kremlin Ballet Theatre was born in 1990 on the initiative of its founder and present artistic director, Andrei Petrov. At that time, the Kremlin Palace was the State Academic Bolshoi Theatre of Russia’s second stage and its productions were shown here on a regular basis. Later on, when the Bolshoi stopped using the Kremlin Palace, Petrov had the idea of creating an independent company, based on this theatre.

Photos by Jack Devant © with kind permission of the Birgitta Festival 2013 and Kremlin Ballet Theatre, special thanks to Heili Vaus-Tamm and Andrei Petrov.