The latest edition of the annual dance galas presented by Ballet de Catalunya, which bring together ballet stars from around the world at Barcelona’s Liceu Opera House, offered two particularly striking performances on its opening night. The first was Olga Smirnova’s Diamonds (if only the Liceu could host a full production of Balanchine’s Jewels), hypnotic and sumptuous. The second was the Black Swan danced by Chloe Misseldine, a Chinese American ballerina who, at twenty-four, is currently the youngest principal dancer at American Ballet Theatre.
Misseldine displayed exceptional formal clarity and a remarkable interpretive command. Her Odile emerges with elegance and ease, fully formed, as if shaped by a lifetime devoted to the role. (Her partner, Joo Won Ahn, deserves special mention for enhancing the fluidity of a notoriously demanding pas de deux.) The combination of Misseldine’s stage maturity and technical virtuosity, alongside her youth, suggests that her artistic ceiling may be limitless. At just twenty-four, she already commands one of the most challenging roles in the classical repertoire—one can only wonder what she might achieve a decade from now.
I visited Misseldine in her dressing room the day after the gala, just after the morning ballet class on the Liceu stage. She projected a quiet affability, the same serene presence she had brought to the stage the night before, performing for two thousand spectators in regal costumes, sparkling jewels, theatrical makeup, and pointe shoes. The dancers who captivate me most often share this magnetic introspection: they do not appear to dance in deliberate pursuit of the audience’s gaze, yet—perhaps for precisely this reason—the audience cannot look away.
Misseldine tells me that what she enjoys most about her work is the process of building a character and the thrill of bringing it to the stage. For her, nothing is more rewarding than making the audience feel genuine joy. In recent seasons, she has had numerous opportunities to expand her repertoire. Last spring, she made her debut as Tatiana in Onegin, based on Pushkin’s novel with choreography by John Cranko. This fall, she danced Sylvia, the title role in Frederick Ashton’s ballet of the same name. When it comes to dream roles, Misseldine singles out Nikiya, the heroine of La Bayadère—a part she has so far performed only in a shortened version of the ballet, Kingdom of the Shades.
Despite being a classic by Marius Petipa—the most influential choreographer in ballet history, responsible for such iconic works as Swan Lake and The Nutcracker—La Bayadère displays a kind of Orientalism that has come under increasing scrutiny in recent years. Misseldine notes that today it is often considered “inappropriate” to present the full ballet. I respond that this sounds very American. She agrees emphatically, perhaps with a touch of exasperation.
Among the roles she has already conquered, her favorite is the dual role of Odette and Odile in Swan Lake. It is hardly surprising that this emblematic ballet holds special meaning for Misseldine: following her New York debut, Susan Jaffe, artistic director of American Ballet Theatre, stepped onto the stage of the Metropolitan Opera House to promote her to principal dancer in the summer of 2024. Misseldine considers the pas de deux between Odile and the Prince the most challenging in the repertoire, though she prefers to dance it as part of a full performance rather than as a stand-alone excerpt in a gala, such as the one at the Liceu.
At first, this preference seems counterintuitive. By the time the Black Swan appears in Act III of Swan Lake, the principal dancer has already endured the punishing technical and artistic demands of the White Swan. Wouldn’t it be easier to step onto the stage better rested? But I soon come to understand her reasoning. For a dancer who openly declares her love for the narrative dimension of classical ballet, it is essential to be able to construct a character’s emotional arc from beginning to end.
When I ask Misseldine which qualities she values most in other dancers, she emphasizes words like “authenticity” and “simplicity,” describing how deeply she is moved when someone can inhabit a role without slipping into dramatic excess. Her answer reflects the chameleon-like quality I perceive in her, as if she possesses a gift for striking the delicate balance between suppressing the ego and preserving a core of individuality—an essential skill when stepping into a character’s skin.
Misseldine often returns to the idea of simplicity, and in the hours and days after our conversation, I find myself reflecting on it repeatedly. In the collective imagination, ballerinas are frequently portrayed as neurotic, anorexic, hyper-competitive, obsessive young women. Popular representations tend to exaggerate these traits. Speaking of a recent television series set in the ballet world, Misseldine notes how absurd she finds the notion of “thinking about laundry while dancing Swan Lake,” as one of the characters does. And yet, I have always felt that this cliché contains a kernel of truth.
The ballerina pursues an ideal: the pure expression of a classical aesthetic—principles of harmony, proportion, and clarity—that she can achieve only, paradoxically, through an extraordinary degree of determination and resilience, both physical and psychological. Competition within the ballet world is ruthless. The odds of reaching the rank of principal dancer in one of the world’s leading companies are about as slim as becoming a professional soccer star. And yet, when I ask Misseldine whether she feels like the kind of dancer marked by destiny, she simply repeats: “For me, ballet is simple.”
If it is true that ballet attracts and cultivates certain character traits, it is also true that younger dancers have generally trained in environments somewhat more attentive to mental health than those of previous eras. There is something generational in Misseldine’s serenity—in her ability to maintain a certain distance from her own exceptionalism, as well as in her desire to nurture a life beyond the intensely consuming dynamics of a ballet company. She speaks of hobbies such as sewing, exploring new dance styles, listening to classical music, and reading.
But there is also a deeper dimension to the importance Misseldine assigns to simplicity. She is the daughter of Yan Chen, a former soloist with American Ballet Theatre. (It is worth noting that, unlike in many other artistic disciplines, elite ballet is relatively resistant to nepotism: a lack of talent cannot be concealed, and companies stake their prestige on audiences with especially high expectations.) Misseldine grew up immersed in classical dance, but she was never pressured at home to pursue it. Chen—now her repertory coach—knew how to guide her without imposing a path. The young dancer likely never experienced ballet as a tyrannical force demanding absolute devotion, but rather as something grounded and familiar, as earthy and everyday as a mother. Misseldine did not only dance; growing up, she also practiced water sports in the lake next to her family’s home—an experience that, she says, helped her develop a strong sense of balance, a crucial skill for dancing on pointe.
Within the stylistic spectrum of ballet, Misseldine positions herself firmly in the purest classical tradition. Her body glides through form with exemplary clarity, evoking a sense of almost divine simplicity. In her, ballet becomes simple—like a Platonic form, like a sculpture revealed within a block of marble, or like a swan breaking through the surface of a lake to rise into view.
