New director for Norwegian National Ballet

Posted on October 17, 2011

Ingrid Lorentzen has been appointed director of the Norwegian National Ballet, starting on August 1, 2012.

Lorentzen has danced with the company for 14 years, performing leading roles in its classical and modern repertoire, including Swan Lake and works by Paul Lightfoot and Sol León, Jiri Kylián and Jo Strømgren. In 2001, she won the Critics’ Award for her role in Kim Brandstrup’s Place of Stone. She has also worked outside the company, as choreographer, dancer and actor. She is a member of Arts Council Norway and the Art Council’s dance committee.

Tom Remlov, the administrative director of the National Norwegian Opera & Ballet, said: “Ingrid Lorentzen is a well-loved and highly respected artist who has helped create the success the National Ballet is now enjoying, and who has also been an inquisitive and active stakeholder in Norwegian cultural and social life.” Ingrid Lorentzen said: “Never has the Norwegian National Ballet had a better point of departure and greater potential than now.”

Lorentzen takes up her appointment at the same time as Per Boye Hansen, the new director of the Norwegian National Opera. Both will serve for a period of five years, joining music director John Helmer Fiore.

Picture: Per Boye Hansen and Ingrid Lorentzen outside Oslo Opera House. Photograph: Erik Berg

Zoe Anderson

Zoë was born in Edinburgh, and saw her first dance performances at the Festival there. She is the dance critic of The Independent, and has also written for The Independent on Sunday, The Scotsman and Dancing Times. In 2002, she received her doctorate from the University of York for a thesis on “Nationhood and epic romance: Ariosto, Sidney, Spenser”. She is the author of The Royal Ballet: 75 Years and The Ballet Lover’s Companion.