Ekaterina Shipulina was born in 1979 in Perm, Russia to a family of dancers. From 1989 to 1994 she studied at the Perm State Choreographic College. In 1994 she was accepted to the Bolshoi Ballet Academy in Moscow and continued her training there, graduating in 1998 (class of Ludmila Litavkina). She joined Bolshoi Ballet as a corps de ballet member the same year. Ms. Shipulina is a Leading Soloist with the company. She is coached there by the former Bolshoi Principal Dancer Tatiana Golikova.

Ms. Shipulina’s repertoire at the Bolshoi includes the dual role of Odette-Odile in Swan Lake, Kitri in Don Quixote, Medora and Gulnare in Le Corsaire, Jeanne in Flames of Paris, the Ballerina in Alexei Ratmansky’s The Bright Stream, Esmeralda in Roland Petit’s Notre-Dame de Paris, Cinderella in Yuri Possokhov’s Cinderella, Mekhmene Banu in Yuri Grigorovich’s Legend of Love and Aegina in his Spartacus, Gamzatti in La Bayadere, Myrtha in Giselle, the Lilac Fairy in Sleeping Beauty, the seventh waltz and the Prelude in Les Sylphides (Chopiniana), the Heir’s Wife in Boris Eifman’s Russian Hamlet. She has also performed principal roles in Possokhov’s Magrittomania, Christopher Wheeldon’s Misericordes, John Neumeier’s Midsummer Night’s Dream (Hermia), Twyla Tharp’s In the Upper Room, George Balanchine’s Symphony in C (1st and 4th Movement) and Agon (Pas de Deux), as well as Ratmansky’s Russian Seasons (Girl in Green, Girl in Yellow) and Jeu de Cartes.

Ms. Shipulina created principal roles in Mr. Eifman’s Russian Hamlet (the Heir’s Wife), Mr. Ratmansky’s Jeu de Cartes, Mr. Possokhov’s Magrittomania, and Mr. Wheeldon’s Misericordes.

Ms. Shipulina won the Silver medal at the Prix de Luxembourg International Ballet Competition (1999) and the Silver medal at the Moscow International Ballet Competition (2001). She received the Triumph Award for Achievement in Arts and Letters in 2002 and Russian Ballet Magazine’s Soul of the Dance Award in 2004. Ms. Shipulina is an Honored Artist of Russia (2009).