Biography

Remi Wortmeyer, Dutch National Ballet principal dancer.

Since graduating from the Australian Ballet School as dux in 2001 Remi has danced some of ballet’s most recognisable roles including Chevalier Des Grieux in Manon, the poet in Les Sylphides, the princes in The Nutcracker and The Sleeping Beauty, the title role in Petrouchka, and the thrilling In the Middle Somewhat Elevated. His 2011 turn as Aminta in John Neumeier’s electric and emotional Sylvia was a revelation for critics and audiences alike. That same year he was voted number 15 in Dance Europe’s critical list of the world’s top 100 dancers.

For eight years Remi was a member of the Australian Ballet with whom he danced full-length principal roles at the Sydney Opera House and other great stages around the world. He also had the opportunity to train at the Royal Ballet Covent Garden and New York City Ballet, and it was at the Lincoln Centre in New York that Remi prepared his “ten minutes of perfection” – the Jerome Robbins / Mikhail Baryshnikov solo A Suite Of Dances - for performance. Remi made his Russian debut in 2012 at St Petersburg’s Mikhailovsky Theatre as part of an all-star gala celebrating the choreography of John Neumeier.

In 2008 Remi premiered the pastoral couple pas de deux in Symphonie Fantastique, a work choreographed on him by Krzysztof Pastor and performed at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris. The following year he created roles for new ballets Scuola di Ballo and Dyad 1929 by Alexei Ratmansky and Wayne McGregor of the Bolshoi and Royal Ballet respectively. He is currently in the studio with Christopher Wheeldon preparing for the choreographer’s latest full-length premiere, Cinderella.

Remi’s self-choreographed ballet-opera Fade Not (libretto by Malcolm Rock and score by Lisa Cheney) premiered at Sydney Theatre in 2009. Critics called it “the sweetest swoon, enchanting” and compared its partnering with that of Kenneth MacMillan. Later that same year he created two works for Melbourne Ballet Company: Fantaisie Impromptu danced to Chopin, and the “brilliant” Tadzio based on Benjamin Britten’s Death in Venice. His ballet Magdalene, or, In Defence of Beauty (also with Rock and composer Chloè Charody) was commissioned by Dutch National Ballet and performed at the Muziektheater Amsterdam (one of Europe’s largest ballet stages). His latest work for the company, La Source, is currently touring the Netherlands.

In 2005 Remi received a standing ovation for dancing the Grand Tarantella, a performance that earned him the inaugural Walter Burke Award and the opportunity to spend 2006 traversing the Metropolitan Opera House stage and touring the USA as a member of New York’s American Ballet Theatre.

Remi has been nominated for an Australian Dance Award, Green Room Award and Sir Robert Helpmann Award (the latter for his Red pas de deux in Jiri Kylian’s Forgotten Land) and has won decorations internationally including a silver medal at the Eighth Asian Pacific International Ballet Competition in Japan dancing Don Quixote’s Basilio, the peasant pas de deux from Giselle, and Natalie Weir’s Jabula.

Winning the Diana Ramsay Scholarship in 2003 allowed Remi to tour to the Paris Opera Ballet, English National Ballet, Italy’s Aterballetto, Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo, La Scala Ballet and Zurich Ballet. He appeared as a guest principal with all-male comedy ballet troupe Les Ballets Grandiva during its 2007 Australian tour.

Remi began dancing in Adelaide at the age of three. He trained at Terry Simpson Studios. He holds an Advanced Diploma of Dance (Honours) from the Australian Ballet School.