Who is José Martinez, the new director of dance at the Paris Opera?

Europe 1 with AFP 4:48 p.m., October 28, 2022

It is a homecoming for José Martinez, the new director of dance at the Paris Opera who had shone as a star of the prestigious ballet company, before pursuing a career as a choreographer and director.

The 53-year-old Spaniard began his training as a dancer in Cartagena (south-eastern Spain) with professor Pilar Molina.

He left his native country at the age of 14

It all started with a misunderstanding: at the age of 9, "I accompanied my little sister to her dance class and that day there was a party to mark the end of the year; I I thought that was what dancing was and I asked my parents to enroll me", he told the daily

in 2011. He left his native country at 14 to join the International Dance Center Rosella Hightower in Cannes, without speaking a word of French.

He won first prize in the Lausanne competition, his entry ticket to the Paris Opera School of Dance in 1987.

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A year later, he joined the Ballet de l'Opéra at the age of 19 and rose in rank until obtaining the supreme title of star on May 31, 1997, at the end of the performance of

in the role of James .

For many years, her favorite partner will be the star Agnès Letestu, their slender silhouettes marrying perfectly on stage.

One of the Opera's dancers who has received the most awards

A noble dancer par excellence, slender, with a refined technique and an elegant incarnation of the roles of princes, he is one of the dancers of the Opera who has received the most prizes in his career, in particular the gold medal at the Concours de Varna in 1992 or the Léonide Massine-Positano prize in 1998. "When you become a star dancer, you never stop wanting to prove that you belong. Then, I realized that perfection did not exist and that the most important thing was to convey something to the public”, he also confided to

.

In 2011, he left the Paris Opera following a performance of Les

, a ballet he choreographed in homage to Marcel Carné's film and which was hailed as a success by critics.

He has signed various choreographies since 2002 including adaptations of classical ballets.

He will devote himself "exclusively to his activity as director of dance"

Succeeding Nacho Duato, he took the helm of the National Spanish Dance Company, where he had to renew the repertoire and faced funding difficulties.

"He was able to give a new identity to the company, in a tense economic and social context", underlines the Paris Opera in its press release on Friday.

After two terms, as required by the rule, he left his post in 2019 and continued to reassemble his ballets in different companies.

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"I respect tradition but it's to move towards modernity," he recently told a Spanish regional newspaper.

Upon his appointment, the Opera announced that he would devote himself "exclusively to his activity as director of dance (...) thus renouncing his activity as a choreographer, with the exception of two commitments made previously", in Bordeaux and in Stockholm in 2023.