Benedicte Bemet is the winner of the 2015 Telstra Ballet Dancer Award. Worth $20 000, the Telstra Ballet Dancer Award (TBDA)is an annual prize, recognizing exceptional talent and achievements of one dancer fom the Australian Ballet. Nominees are judged on their performance both on and off stage.
Queensland born Bemet joined the Australian Ballet in 2012 and took out the Telstra People’s Choice Award, decided by public vote in 2013. This year’s Telstra People’s Choice Award, worth $5000, was won by Marcus Morelli.
The other four nominees this year were Jasmin Durham, Robyn Hendricks, recently-appointed principal artist Ako Kondo and Amanda McGuigan. Many of the Australian Ballet’s best-known dancers have been former winners of the award, including Matthew Lawrence (2003 winner), Amber Scott (2004), Lana Jones (2005), Daniel Gaudiello (2007), Kevin Jackson (2008), Ty King-Wall (2010) and Chengwu Guo (2011).
For the first time in 2015, a series of artist-dancer collaborations revealed the 2015 Telstra Ballet Dancer Award nominees. The series spanned an array of art categories with some of Australia’s most talented installation artists and designers. See Bemet and Morelli’s videos below.