The Colombian-Belgian Annabelle Lopez Ochoa completed her dance education at the Royal Ballet School of Flanders in Belgium. She started choreographing at the early age of 11, and decided in 2003 to end her dance career to focus her energies solely on choreography. In that same year she was hailed “rising star of the Dutch dance scene” (NRC newspaper) and only 7 years later the Temecula Performing Arts Examiner wrote: ”Ochoa is truly a masterful choreographer with an edge for what dance can and should be in this constantly changing industry”.

Annabelle is a prolific choreographer who has created works for 60 dance companies around the world such as the Dutch National Ballet, Ballet of Flanders, Pennsylvania Ballet, BalletX, BJM-Danse Montreal, Ballet Hispánico, Ballet Nacional de Cuba, Scottish Ballet, Ballet Nacional de Cuba, West Australian Ballet, Joffrey Ballet, English National Ballet, Hong Kong Ballet, Grands Ballets Canadiens, San Francisco Ballet and New York City Ballet.

Among the honors her work has received; A Streetcar Named Desire, created for the Scottish Ballet in 2012 won Best Choreography Classical from Critics’ Circle National Dance Awards UK and was nominated for the prestigious Olivier Award. Broken Wings, the life and work of Frida Kahlo created for English National Ballet was named one of 2016’s best premieres by Dance Europe and other Newspapers; and was nominated for several Critics’ Circle National Dance Awards. Sombrerísimo, created for Ballet Hispánico is on the repertoire of four companies and received Cuba’s Villanueva Award in 2015. Annabelle is the recipient of the Jacob’s Pillow Choreography Award 2019.

Since the start of the pandemic in spring 2020, Annabelle has choreographed and edited 8 short dance films (Grassville is her 9th). She is forging new ways of reaching dance audiences, with creations that are not mere records of performances meant to be seen in person, but intentional artworks in themselves.