A year later he was appointed artistic director of ABT where, for the next decade, he introduced a new generation of dancers and choreographers. From 1990-2002, Mr. Baryshnikov was director and dancer of the White Oak Dance Project, a modern dance company he co-founded with choreographer Mark Morris. In 2005, he launched Baryshnikov Arts Center (BAC) in New York City, a creative space for presenting and nurturing multidisciplinary artists from around the globe. Under his leadership as artistic director, BAC’s programs serve more than 700 artists and 22,000 audience members annually. Mr. Baryshnikov is an Academy Award-nominated actor, and a photographer whose work has been exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide. His photographs have been featured in publications such as Aperture and Vanity Fair, among others. His published work includes the book Merce My Way (2008). Among Mr. Baryshnikov’s many awards are the Kennedy Center Honors, the National Medal of Honor, the Commonwealth Award, the Chubb Fellowship, the Jerome Robbins Award, and the 2012 Vilcek Award. In 2010, he was given the rank of Officer of the French Legion of Honor.

He has staged operas at the Salzburg Festspiele since 2012, and will continue in the 2015 and 2016 seasons. His most recent staging there was of Trovatore featuring Placido Domingo and Anna Netrebko. His most recent opera premiere was La Damnation de Faust with Opera de Paris, featuring Jonas Kaufman in December 2015. In 2018, he will direct a new staging of Lohengrin at the Bayreuth Wagner Festival. Mr. Hermanis’s theater productions have been presented at major theater festivals ranging from Avignon to Edinburgh, and have toured to more than 40 countries. His many accolades include the Europe Prize New Theatre Realities, the Stanislavsky Award, two Golden Mask Awards (Moscow), Max Reinhardt Pen (Salzburg Festspiele), Nestroy Preis (Austria), and the Konrad Wolf Award (Germany). He has been artistic director of The New Riga Theatre since 1997.