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Photo credit © James Bort OnP

Dorothée Gilbert

About this Artist

Following a November 2007 performance of The Nutcracker (Nureyev), in which she danced the role of Clara for the first time, Gilbert was named Étoile of the Paris Opera Ballet. 

Since then, she has added to her repertoire Swanilda in Coppélia, the title role in La Petite Danseuse (Bart), The Four Temperaments, the first movement of Symphony in C, Rubies in Joyaux (“Jewels”), Apollo, Mozartiana, the Divertissement from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Theme and Variations and Agon (Balanchine), Serait-ce la mort? (Béjart), the title role in Giselle (after Coralli and Perrot), Tatiana in Onegin (Cranko), Nuages, Bella Figura (Kylián), the title role of La Sylphide (Lacotte after Taglioni), Suite en blanc (Lifar), Manon in L’Histoire de Manon (MacMillan), Triade, Chloé in Daphnis et Chloé (Millepied), Prudence in La Dame aux camélias, Henriette and Raymonda in Raymonda, one of the Sisters and the title role in Cinderella, Nikiya in La Bayadère, Odette/Odile in Swan Lake and Juliet in Romeo and Juliet (Nureyev), Albertine in Proust ou les intermittences du cœur, Le Jeune Homme et la mort (Petit), En Sol, and the Ballerina in The Concert, Other Dances (Robbins). She is a Chevalier de l’ordre des Arts et des Lettres.  

Principal creations and repertoire entries at the Paris Opera Ballet: 

AndréAuria (Lock, 2002), Lise in La Fille mal gardée (Ashton, 2007), Genus (McGregor, 2007), Third Symphony of Gustav Mahler (Neumeier, 2009), L’Anatomie de la sensation (McGregor, 2011), Psyché (Ratmansky, 2011), Le Chant de la terre (Neumeier, 2015), The Goldberg Variations (Robbins, 2016), Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet (Balanchine, 2016), Tar and Feathers (Kylián, 2016), Renaissance (Bertaud, 2017), Fancy Free (Robbins, 2018), and Le Rouge et le noir (Lacotte, 2021). 

1995 
After studying at the Toulouse Conservatoire, Gilbert enters the Paris Opera Ballet School. 

2000 
She joins the Corps de Ballet at the age of 17. 

2003 
Gilbert is named to the position of Coryphée. She is awarded the Paris Opera Ballet’s AROP Dance Prize. She dances the Pas de deux of the Peasants in Giselle (after Coralli and Perrot) and in ballets by Nureyev and Balanchine. 

2004 
She is promoted to Sujet. She wins the Prix du Cercle Carpeaux.  

2006 
Gilbert is named Première danseuse. She receives the Prix Léonide Massine and the Prix Ballet the same year.