Gillian Murphy

Gillian Murphy is Artistic Associate at American Repertory Ballet and is currently celebrating over twenty years as a principal ballerina with American Ballet Theatre (ABT). Her repertoire includes leading roles in ABT’s most iconic full-length classics and in shorter works by luminary choreographers of the past and present. As a teenager, Murphy was awarded the Prix de Lausanne Espoir, and she joined American Ballet Theatre in 1996. After being honored with a Princess Grace Foundation Award, Murphy was promoted to Soloist in 1999 and to Principal Dancer in 2002. She starred as Odette/Odile in ABT’s PBS television production of Swan Lake and as Giselle in the New Zealand Film Commission’s movie of Stiefel and Kobborg’s production of Giselle at the Royal New Zealand Ballet, where she was a Principal Guest Artist for three years. Murphy has danced as a guest artist throughout the world, performing with the Mariinsky Ballet, the Royal Swedish Ballet, the Staatsballett Berlin, the Kiev Ballet, the Australian Ballet, as a ballerina with the Metropolitan Opera, and in numerous other international engagements and galas. She is a recipient of a Princess Grace Statue Award and an honorary doctorate from her high school alma mater, the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. In 2018, Murphy graduated summa cum laude from St. Mary’s College of California with a Bachelor of Arts. In 2019, Murphy completed the Harvard Business School’s “Crossover into Business” program and served on the international jury panel of the Prix de Lausanne. In recent years, she has enjoyed teaching classes at American Ballet Theatre, the ABT Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School, the Dance Theater of Harlem, the City Ballet of San Diego, Kaatsbaan, and the Princeton Ballet School. Murphy is excited to visit Alaska for the first time and to teach the students this summer at Juneau Dance Theatre! For the most current updates, Murphy can be followed on Instagram @gillianemurphy.