Nicoletta Manni and Timofej Andrijashenko in Caravaggio

Nicoletta Manni and Timofej Andrijashenko in Caravaggio, music by Bruno Moretti da Claudio Monteverdi, choreography by Mauro Bigonzetti. Stand With Ukraine, Ballet For Peace fundraising gala, Teatro di San Carlo, Napoli, Italy, 4.4.2022.

Nicoletta Manni (born 1991) is an Italian ballet dancer. A member of the La Scala Theatre Ballet since 2009, she was promoted to prima ballerina in April 2014. Born in Galatina, in the province of Lecce in the south east of Italy, Manni began dancing as a small child, encouraged by her mother Anna De Matteis. When she was 12, she began training at the La Scala Theatre Ballet School, graduating in 2009. When she was 17, she joined the Berlin State Ballet but returned to La Scala four years later in 2013.

Timofej Andrijashenko was born in Riga and trained at the State National Academy. In 2009, during the international competition Dance City of Spoleto, he won a full scholarship to the Russian Ballet College in Genoa, under the direction of Irina Kashkova, graduating in 2013. In March 2014 he joined the corps de ballet of the Opera Theatre in Rome, under the direction of Micha von Hoecke, dancing principal and soloist roles in the 2013/14 season. In November 2014 he joined the corps de ballet of La Scala Theatre Ballet, promoted to principal in February 2018. Made his Royal Ballet debut in the 2018/19 Season dancing Romeo (Romeo and Juliet) as a Guest Artist.

Photos by Jack Devant © with kind permission of Teatro di San Carlo, special thanks to Giulia Romito