A winner of many awards (Prix Beaumarchais, Médicis hors-les-murs, Uchida Shogakukin, Léonard de Vinci, to name but a few), he was dubbed Chevalier dans l’Ordre National du Mérite in 2007 and Officier des Arts et des Lettres in 2013. For his personal style, which combines elegance and performance, he has been invited to work with the Ballets of the Grand Théâtre de Genève, the Paris Opera, the Opéra du Rhin, the Opéra du Nord and the Ballet National de Marseille.
In 2019, Michel Kelemenis created the septet COUP DE GRÂCE, a resilient echo to the Paris terrorist attacks. The piece was erased by the health crisis, at the end of which he created 8M3, a programme of 10 solos inviting the regional choreographic community to take part: it premiered in 2020 as part of L’INGÉNUE SORCIÈRE. In 2021 he presented LÉGENDE, the company’s fourth opus for young audiences. In 2023 he created MAGNIFIQUES, a hymn to youth for nine dancers, and LOIN TAIN for nineteen performers from the Ballet de l'Opéra National du Capitole in Toulouse, a tribute to the painter Pierre Soulages. In 2024, Michel Kelemenis presented VERSUS, a “duet for four dancers”. In parallel with the company’s tours, he also spearheads many initiatives combining art and education, in the fields of international cooperation (in Poland, Japan, South Africa, India, Korea, China, and now Montenegro), higher education and workforce integration. As soon as it opened, KLAP Maison Pour la Danse became an amplifier for all these initiatives, which also reached out to young people and regional communities.
Michel Kelemenis seeks to achieve a balance between the abstract and the figurative. Music plays an essential role, and he often commissions original works. His work sometimes deals with topical themes (love in the age of AIDS, terrorist violence, environmental crises, etc.) He also designs the sets for many of his pieces.
