Balkiya Zhanburchinova

With the ensemble since 2024/25

Balkiya Zhanburchinova studied dance at the A. Seleznev State Choreography School in Almaty in her native Kazakhstan. In 2010, she received a scholarship from the Foundation of the First President of Kazakhstan, which enabled her to study at the Vaganova Ballet Academy in St. Petersburg in 2011 with a further scholarship. Her first engagement took her to the National Ballet of Kazakhstan in Astana in 2012. She won various competitions, including the gold medal (2008) and the Grand Prix (2010) at the International Ballet Competition in Almaty and the gold medal at the 2013 Tanzolymp Berlin. From 2013 to 2017, she was a member of Ballett Kiel, where Yaroslav Ivanenko created the female title role in Romeo and Juliet for her. In 2015, she received the Kiel Theater Sponsorship Award. In the 2017/18 season, she was engaged by the Staatsballett Karlsruhe and danced the title role in Sir Kenneth MacMillan's “Romeo and Juliet”, among others. This was followed by a season at the Tiroler Landestheater Innsbruck, where ballet director Enrique Gasa Valga created the role of Titania in “A Midsummer Night's Dream” for her. From 2019-2024, she returned to the Karlsruhe State Ballet.
Her repertoire includes roles such as Odette/Odile in Yaroslav Ivanenko's “Swan Lake”, Aurora in “Sleeping Beauty”, Swanilda in “Coppelia”, Livia in Bridget Breiner's “Ruß - Eine Geschichte von Aschenputtel” and Maria in “Was ihr wollt” as well as in “Madrigal” and “Por Vos Muero” by Nacho Duato, “Oktett” by Uwe Scholz, '“A day in a life” by Trey McIntyre, Jeroen Verbrungen's “Der Feuervogel”, David Dawson's “A Million Kisses to my Skin” and “Giselle” as well as in Glen Tetley's “Voluntaries” and she danced in choreographies by Hans van Manen, Youri Vàmos, Germinal Casado, Annabel Lopez Ochoa, Jiří Kylián, Marguerite Donlon, Cathy Marston, Sir Frederick Ashton and August Bournonville.
At Ballett am Rhein, she has appeared in Bridget Breiner’s “Biolographie”, as the Queen in “Dornröschen”, William Forsythe’s “Enemy in the Figure”, Glen Tetley’s “Voluntaries”, and David Dawson’s “Empire Noir”.