Photo by Joe Schmid.

Biography

Choreographer, Anna Karenina

Christian Spuck comes from Marburg, Germany and was trained at the John Cranko School in Stuttgart. He began his dance career with Jan Lauwers’ Needcompany and Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker’s Ensemble Rosas. In 1995, he became a member of Stuttgart Ballet and served as the company’s Resident Choreographer from 2001 to 2012. In Stuttgart, he created 15 world premieres and worked with numerous renowned ballet companies in Europe and US as Royal Ballet of Flanders, The Norwegian National Ballet, Aalto Ballett Essen, Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal, Czech National Ballet, Gauthier Dance//Dance Company Theaterhaus Stuttgart and Stuttgart Ballet.

Christian is also active in the field of opera. Gluck’s Orphée et Euridice at Staatsoper Stuttgart was followed by Verdi’s Falstaff at Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden, Berlioz’s La Damnation de Faust and Wagner's Der fliegende Holländer at Deutsche Oper Berlin.

From 2012 to 2023, Christian was Director of Ballett Zürich. He created 15 works, some of which were taken over by international companies such as The Norwegian National Ballet, Stanislavski Theatre, Korean National Ballet, Bavarian State Ballet, Adelaide Festival in Australia, Het Nationale Oper & Ballet, Finnish National Ballet and Staatsballett Berlin. His ballet Orlando premiered at the Bolshoi Theatre in 2021.

For his work he received numerous prices and distinctions. The production Poppea//Poppea was voted one of the 10 most successful dance productions worldwide by the magazine Dance Europe in 2010 and was awarded the German Theatre Prize DER FAUST in 2011, as well as the Italian Danza/Danza Award. For Winterreise, he was awarded with the Prix Benois de la Danse 2019. In 2019, he staged Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern (The Little Match Girl) by Helmut Lachenmann with Ballett Zürich, which was awarded Production of the Year by German magazine tanz and Ballett Zürich as Company of the Year.

In the 2023/24 season, he was appointed Artistic Director of Staatsballett Berlin and created Bovary.