Maria Kochetkova was born in Moscow in 1984 and trained at the Bolshoi Ballet Academy. After graduating and winning the prestigious Prix de Lausanne ballet competition in 2002, she became an apprentice with the Royal Ballet in London. From 2007 to 2018, she served as a principal dancer with the San Francisco Ballet and held a principal position at the American Ballet Theatre in New York from 2015 to 2017.
Throughout her career, she has also guested with esteemed companies including Teatro alla Scala in Milan, Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, Tokyo Ballet, Ballet Nacional de Cuba, Semperoper in Dresden, Staatsballett Berlin, the Norwegian National Ballet, Rome Opera, Royal Danish Ballet, National Ballet of Canada and Hong Kong Ballet.
In addition to performing the entire classical repertoire, she has showcased her technical versatility through close collaborations with choreographers such as Ella Rothschild, Marcos Morau, Benjamin Millepied, Drew Jacoby, Lilliana Barros, William Forsythe, Jerome Bel, Sebastian Kloborg, Julian Nicosia and David Dawson. Through this work, she has established herself as an artist dedicated to exploring the future significance and role of ballet and dance. In recognition of her contributions, she was invited in 2019 to curate the program “Catch Her If You Can” at The Joyce Theatre in New York.
In Denmark, she has recently participated in both the Chamber Ballet and Copenhagen Summer Dance as well as guesting with the Royal Danish Ballet and in March of this year, she performed at the Glyptoteket alongside the dance company La Veronal.
