"Stina Quagebeur managed in many instances, to express abstract ideas through dance with

the sort of clarity that indicates serious talent." - DANCING TIMES

About Stina Quagebeur

Born in Belgium, Stina started dancing and choreographing by the time she was 7. She was often taken to see works by Mats Ek and Maurice Béjart in Brussels. Those performances had a huge impact on her and gave her the inspiration to start choreographing. At the age of 11 she came to England to study at the Royal Ballet School where she won several prizes with her pieces at the annual Choreographic competition. She continued her training at the English National Ballet School and then subsequently joined the company by the time she was 18.

She has been choreographing throughout her career as a dancer and was named Associate Choreographer of the company in 2019 after creating her first one act work for the company Nora.

She has created a total of 18 works for ENB and she has gone on to choreograph for The Royal Ballet's Lauren Cuthbertson at the Joyce Theatre, New York, The Opera La Clemenza Di Tito in Vienna, Northern Ballet in Leeds and has future works coming up in both Europe and America.

She was awarded Emerging Artist at the National Dance Awards 2020 while also being nominated for Best Classical Choreography with Nora. She has a distinctive language fusing classical ballet with contemporary dance and making Ballet more human to audiences of today.

As a dancer Stina has created roles in all of Akram Khan’s work with the company. Dust, Myrtha in Akram Khan’s Giselle and most recently she has created the role of the Doctor in Akram Khan’s Creature.

workS

Most recently in November 2022 her work Take Five Blues was extended for the Ek Forsythe Quagebeur Triple at Sadler’s Wells. This was Tamara Rojo’s last programme at ENB. In October Stina retired from the stage with Tamara at Théâtre des Champs-Elysées Paris dancing Myrtha in Akram Khan’s Giselle. She will now be focusing full time on her choreographic career.

In September 2022 she premiered her first work for Northern Ballet. Nostalgia was part of the Made in Leeds programme and premiered at the Leeds Playhouse before coming the The Linbury theatre, ROH, London.

The original Take Five Blues was created for English National Ballet’s Digital Season 2020. Created with Film Director Shaun James Grant. It is available to watch on ENB at Home. Take Five Blues was nominated Best Digital Choreography at the National Dance Awards 2021.

Hollow created for the ENB’s Emerging Dancer Competition 2020 was chosen to be performed as part of the BBC’s Dancing Nation Programme celebrating world class dance from leading UK companies. Based on a couple who contend with depression, and the confusion and displacement it causes between them. Hollow was also programmed as part of the Solstice performances by ENB at the Festival Hall in June 2021.

Nora was her first one act work for ENB’s She Persisted Triple Bill. This work was based on Nora the lead character in Henrik Ibsen's play A Doll’s House. Nora was nominated for Best Classical Choreography and Stina won the award for the Emerging Artist at the UK's National Dance Awards in 2020.   

She went on to choreograph for The Royal Ballet's Lauren Cuthbertson at the The Joyce Theatre, New York in summer 2019 and worked as a choreographer and movement director for Sam Brown's production of La Clemenza Di Tito and also danced the role of Bernice Theatre An Der Wien, Vienna in 2019.

Vera for ENB’s Choreographic Workshop at the Barbican Pit Theatre, London 2014. Was a work based on Vera Brittain’s memoir Testament of Youth from the First World War period. A success amongst critics, Vera was selected to be performed in New York at the Alvin Ailey Citigroup Theatre for the Breaking Glass Project which was supported by a year-long artistic mentorship. The piece was later performed in 2018 in ENB's Lest We Forget triple bill at Sadler’s Wells.  

Directing dance for film and Outreach

She directed her first short film 'Design Perspectives' for the Diaghilev exhibition in collaboration with London college of Fashion. While in 2012 English National Ballet school commissioned her to create a new piece for their end of year performance.

In April 2015 she choreographed for Dance Journeys creating 'Perfect Disorder'. The piece was created on 34 dancers from ENB youth company and selected students from secondary schools. It was performed as a curtain raiser before ENB's Modern Masters Triple Bill at Sadler's Wells. Stina created another Curtain Raiser the following year, Unsilenced which, based on Malala, the Pakistani Pashtun activist for female education and the youngest Nobel Prize laureate.