Maria Shirinkina’s New Year debut

Maria Shirinkina has made a name for herself as a ballerina in the classical and neo-classical repertoires. She joined the Mariinsky Ballet Company in 2006 immediately after graduating from the Perm State School of Dance, where she was taught by the outstanding Ninel Silvanovich. The dancer’s career path began with George Balanchine’s Scotch Symphony in 2010. Critics have spoken of the lightness and ease of Shirinkina’s dance. Last season her repertoire, rich in diverse secondary roles, expanded to include such major solo roles as Syuimbike in Leonid Yakobson’s ballet Shurale and Gulnare in Marius Petipa’s Le Corsaire (revised choreography by Pyotr Gusev).

Shirinkina’s latest character continues the line of romantic, youthful and ethereal images danced at the Mariinsky Theatre, starting in April this year when she appeared as Juliet in Leonid Lavrovsky’s production of Romeo and Juliet. Recently during a tour by the Mariinsky Ballet Company to Spain the dancer performed as Juliet at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia. Spanish critics commented on Shirinkina’s youthfulness and unusual performing abilities, in particular her “incredible flexibility, vital for the onstage embodiment of the ideal image typical for neo-romantic ballet of the 20^th century.”

The performance begins at 14:00.