10-06-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Hamburg Ballet's Artistic Director Leaves After Just 10 Months
The Hamburg Ballet's last director, John Neumeier, led the company for 51 years, transforming it from a provincial troupe into an internationally respected house.
His successor, Demis Volpi, lasted just 10 months.
On Tuesday, Hamburg State Opera said in a news release that its board and Volpi had agreed to terminate his contract at the ballet four years early. The announcement followed weeks of crisis at the company after it emerged that five principal dancers had resigned, and that more than half of the company's dancers had sent a letter to a local lawmaker to complain of a 'toxic working environment' under Volpi.
In Tuesday's release, Volpi said that 'despite intensive efforts,' he could no longer realize his artistic vision and had agreed to depart 'in the interests of all involved.'
Volpi, an Argentine choreographer who previously led the Ballet am Rhein in Düsseldorf, did not respond to a request for an interview, and a spokeswoman for Hamburg Ballet said it would not comment further.
It was not immediately clear what Volpi's departure would mean for the company's coming season, which Volpi had announced in March and is to include the premiere of Alexei Ratmansky's 'Wonderland,' based on Lewis Carroll's novels. Nor is it clear how the company will handle productions of Volpi's work. A new version of Volpi's 'Surrogate Cities' is scheduled to premiere in July. And Volpi's 'Demian,' based on the novel by Hermann Hesse, is scheduled to be performed in December.
The crisis at Hamburg Ballet began in early May when German newspapers widely reported dancers' complaints about its artistic direction under Volpi, as well as accusations that he was insufficiently present during rehearsals.
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