Krzysztof Pastor

Krzysztof Pastor ( Polish pronunciation : ; born 17 December 1956 in Gdańsk, Poland) is a Polish dancer, choreographer and ballet director.

He trained with State Ballet School in Gdańsk 1966–1975.

After his training, he joined the Polish Dance Theatre in Poznań, under direction of the Polish choreographer Conrad Drzewiecki, where in 1977 became a soloist and performed many roles in the company's repertoire.

Between 1979 and 1982 was first soloist of the ballet of the Grand Theater in Łódź, where his repertoire included: Albrecht in Giselle, Prince in The Nutcracker, Armen in Boris Eifman’s Gayane, Vaslav w The Fountain of Bakhchisarai and Prince in Snow White.

After imposition of martial law in Poland, he emigrated to the West in February 1982.

In 1983, he became a soloist with Ballet de l'Opéra de Lyon, where he danced in ballets created by: Gray Veredon, Kurt Jooss, Antony Tudor, Hans Van Manen, Maguy Marin, Nils Christe or Nacho Duato.

From 1985 to 1995 was engaged with the Dutch National Ballet, under direction of Rudi van Dantzig.

He danced many parts in his ballets (e.g. Mercutio in his Romeo and Juliet), but also in ballets by: George Balanchine, Bronislava Nijinska, Frederick Ashton, Hans Van Manen, Toer van Schayk, Jan Linkens, Carolyn Carlson, Nina Wiener, Ted Brandsen or Ashley Page.

He also danced in major classical ballets like The Sleeping Beauty (Bluebird) and Giselle (Hilarion) staged by Peter Wright or Swan Lake (Von Rothbart) choreographed by Rudi van Dantzig.

In this period, he also took up an interest in choreographic work and since 1987 he was creating his pieces during choreographic workshops and on other occasions.

Having some chamber achievements, in 1992 he received an offer to create his first major choreography for the Dutch National Ballet's repertoire.

Then, he created Shostakovich Chamber Symphony, which was his official debut as a choreographer.

In 1994, he made his Warsaw's debut on the stage of Teate Wielki – Polish National Opera choreographing Henryk Mikołaj Górecki’s Symphony No. 3.

In 1995, he gained wider recognition during International Ballet Competition in Helsinki, Finland, where he received Gold Choreography Prize for his duet Detail IV to the music by Zoltán Kodály.

Between 1997 and 1999 he was a resident choreographer with The Washington Ballet, and then he returned to the Dutch National Ballet, but this time as associate choreographer.

In 2000, his Dutch achievements was awarded with Dansersfonds'79 Choreography Prize, and in 2002 his full-length ballet Kurt Weill received three nominations to international Prix Benois de la Danse (Moscow).

He was resident choreographer with the Dutch National Ballet in Amsterdam from 2003 to 2017, director of the Polish National Ballet in Teatr Wielki – Polish National Opera in Warsaw since 2009 and at the same time from 2011 until 2020 was the artistic director of the ballet of the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre in Vilnius.

Krzysztof Pastor was born in Gdańsk to a family of doctors - Jan and Leokadia Pastor.

Since 2003, he took over a prestigious position of the resident choreographer with the Dutch National Ballet.

Ever since he shares this position with outstanding Dutch choreographer Hans Van Manen.

Most of Pastor’s ballets were created in Netherlands, but he was also invited by other ballet companies worldwide like: Australia, Belgium, Czech Republic, Hong Kong, Israel, Lithuania, Latvia, New Zealand, Germany, Sweden, Turkey, USA, Hungary, Great Britain and Italy.

His works were successfully presented during Holland Festival, Holland Dance Festival, Edinburgh International Festival, Dance Salad Festival in Houston or International Ballet Festival "Dance Open" in St. Petersburg.

In Autumn 2008, Pastor came to Poland to discuss restaging his ballet Tristan, in Warsaw's Teatr Wielki.

Production to the music of Richard Wagner was originally created for the Royal Swedish Ballet.

At the time, Waldemar Dąbrowski – Teatr Wielki's general director, offered Pastor to take over the direction of the ballet in Warsaw.

Being interested in this proposal, Pastor decided to return to Poland after 26 years of emigration, setting the conditions of ballet's artistic independence and autonomic operating conditions in the theatre structure, which would be analogous to other major ballet companies worldwide.

Thanks to the efforts of director Dąbrowski, Minister of Culture and National Heritage Bogdan Zdrojewski agreed to appropriate changes in the theater's by-law.

On 18 March 2009 Pastor took over the position of director of the ballet of Warsaw's Teatr Wielki, and in the same year by the decision of Minister Zdrojewski on 29 April it was separated in the structure of the theatre as Polish National Ballet and became equal to Polish National Opera.

In addition to the new duties in Warsaw, Pastor still holds the position of resident choreographer in the Dutch National Ballet, and from 2011 until 2020 he shared his experience with the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre in Vilnius, as ballet's artistic director.

In 2021 he was appointed to the Program Board of the Polish National Institute for Music and Dance.