Carla Körbes

Carla Körbes was born in Porto Alegre, Brazil, and began her ballet training at age 5 with local teachers. At 11, she began studying at Ballet Vera Bublitz. In 1996, Peter Boal, former New York City Ballet (NYCB) principal dancer, danced with her as a guest artist of the school and encouraged her to come to New York to study at the School of American Ballet (SAB). For the 1997–98 academic year, her tuition was paid for by Alexandra Danilova so she could continue at SAB.

In 1999, Körbes won the Mae. L. Wien Award and was made an apprentice with NYCB. She joined the company as a member of the corps de ballet in 2000 and was the Janice Levin Dancer Honoree for 2001–02. In 2005, she was promoted to soloist in and joined Pacific Northwest Ballet as a soloist, being promoted to principal dancer there a year later.

Körbes’ repertory included numerous ballets by George Balanchine, Jerome Robbins, Christopher Wheeldon, William Forsythe, Alexei Ratmansky, and Twyla Tharp, among others. She also performed in most of ballet’s classical works, including Swan Lake, Giselle, and Don Quixote.

Körbes last performed with Pacific Northwest Ballet in 2015. That same year, she joined the L.A. Dance Project as associate director and started teaching at the Colburn School in Los Angeles.