Lucinda Dunn OAM
Presenting at our Dance Teacher & Studio Owner Sessions
Lucinda Dunn received her early training in Sydney with Janece Graham and Tanya Pearson before going on to win a Prix de Lausanne scholarship to study at The Royal Ballet School, London. While in London, Lucinda performed with Birmingham Royal Ballet before returning to Australia in 1991 Lucinda to join The Australian Ballet. In 2002, only a few years with the Company, Lucinda was promoted to Principal Artist. Whilst with the Australian Ballet, Lucinda was recipient of several scholarships to study overseas and has been partnered by many international guests of The Australian Ballet. A diverse and musical dancer with a strong technique, Lucinda excelled in the pure classical ballets and enjoyed portraying characters in story ballets, as well as the physicality of contemporary pieces.
In addition to the ballerina roles in all of the major classical ballets such as Giselle, Romeo and Juliet, Swan Lake and Coppélia, a particular career highlight for Lucinda was dancing the world premiere of Stanton Welch’s The Sleeping Beauty in 2005 and more recently, dancing Firebird and Nutcracker – The Story of Clara by Graeme Murphy. Other highlights include her performances on The Australian Ballet’s tours to London, Tokyo, Italy, Shanghai and New York, as well as dancing lead roles in contemporary works by Christopher Wheeldon, Jiří Kylián, Jerome Robbins, George Balanchine, Twyla Tharp, Nicolo Fonte and Stephen Baynes.
Lucinda has won numerous awards including Australian Dance Award for Outstanding Performance 2008, Helpmann Award nomination for Dance Performer of the Year 2007 and 2004, Mo Award nomination for Dance Performer of the Year 2006, 2005 and 2001, Green Room Award for Best Female Dancer 2005 and Helpmann Award nominations for Best Female Dancer 2011, 2010. In 2015, Lucinda won an Australian Dance Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Dancer for her performance in The Australian Ballet’s Manon.
As Australia’s longest-serving ballerina, Lucinda announced her retirement in 2014 and received a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM), for her service to the performing arts through ballet.
In early 2016, Lucinda attended the Prix de Lausanne ballet competition in Switzerland as one of the members of the jury. She is regularly invited as Guest Teacher and Jury at many national and international competitions and events.