Being groomed for stardom: Italian ballerina Petra Conti

23 year-old Petra Conti is a dan­cer at La Scala in Milan, who is being slowly brought before the pub­lic by dir­ector (ex-director of the Mari­in­sky) Makhar Vaziev.

He first saw her when she spent a year in St Peters­berg at the Mari­in­sky to pol­ish her tech­nique. After the 2008–2009 sea­son with the Bav­arian State Bal­let she decided to return to her homeland:

I pre­ferred to return to Italy, in Munich I never really fit­ted in.

Her Pol­ish mother, a former dan­cer her­self, passed on the pas­sion for dance to her daughter,

I breathed in dance since I was little thanks to my mother.

Her first big break with La Scala bal­let was with Gis­elle,

Idols? Carla Fracci is Gis­elle, my favour­ite role. But I don’t have any par­tic­u­lar role model, each bal­let has its own top interpreter.”

Among the roles that Vaziev has already given her are Gis­elle, Juliet and Tat­jana, as well as the clos­ing per­form­ance of the recent Ray­monda recon­struc­tion at the Teatro alla Scala. Next year he is upping the pace, hop­ing to cre­ate a new Italian star, with roles in the rep­er­toire and new creations.

Since Aless­andra Ferri, Italy has lacked home-grown tal­ent of inter­na­tional stand­ing. Fingers-crossed for Sig.na Conti.

via Valeria Crippa in the Cor­ri­ere della Sera

Video: Petra Conti with boy­friend Eris Nezha in “L’altro Cas­anova” - Photo: as Tat­jana in Eugene One­gin at Teatro alla Scala © Marco Brescia

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