Jiří Kylián

Biography

Born in Prague, Jiří Kylián graduated from the Prague Dance Conservatory in 1967. After completing his studies at the Royal Ballet School in London, he was engaged at John Cranko’s Stuttgarter Ballett from 1969 to 1975. Subsequently, he joined the Nederlands Dans Theater (NDT) in The Hague, where between 1975 and 1977 he served as co-director and choreographer, from 1978 to 1999 as the artistic director, and from 1999 as a choreographer. Besides working with the NDT, he also established NDT 2, for junior dancers between 17 and 22 (1978), and NDT 3, for dancers aged 40 and over (1991). In The Hague, Kylián has spent most of his creative career, and as the head of the NDT he has built up one of the world’s best dance companies, thus having left an indelible footprint of his extraordinary talent and artistry. At the present time, he focuses on his own, particularly visual, projects, and manages the Kylián Foundation NL, including his own Kylián Productions BV. Jiří Kylián has created 100 choreographies, 75 of them for the NDT in The Hague and the rest for the Stuttgarter Ballett, Paris Opéra, Bayerisches Staatsballett, Tokyo Ballet and other compa- nies. His works have been cornerstones of the repertoire of all renowned dance compa- nies worldwide. He has received numerous honours and awards, including: three Vaslav Nijinsky Awards (Monte Carlo, the best cho- reography, the best company and the best work – One of a Kind), the Golden Lion (Venice), Honorary Doctorates from the Juilliard School in New York and the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, the Commander of the Legion of Honour (France), the Medal of Honour for Arts and Science from Beatrix, Queen of the Netherlands. In April 2018, Jiří Kylián was elected as a foreign associate member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts.