Ekaterina Maximova, a former prima ballerina with the Bolshoi ballet, has died at the age of 70.

Ekaterina Maximova，前芭蕾舞团首席女演员，享年70岁。

Aurora¹ in Sleeping Beauty was just one of the leading roles Maximova performed

Maximova joined the company in 1958 and danced all the major classical roles over the next three decades, earning the nickname Ekaterina the Great.

She worked as a ballet coach until the time of her death and was described as "a teacher from God" by colleagues.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said her death was a great loss to world culture as well as Russian art.

He continued: "With her brilliant dancing, astonishing grace and beauty she literally² charmed audiences."

Maximova and Vasiliev were partners on stage and off

'Irretrievable（不可挽回的） loss'

The dancer had received Russia's highest artistic³ honour - the title of People's Artist of Russia - in 1973.

Maximova's death came as a shock as she was not known to be ill. She had been at work at the Bolshoi on the Sunday before her death, and attended a performance of Spartacus in the evening.

Artistic director of the Bolshoi, Yuri Burlaka, said that "all Russians will mourn" this "irretrievable loss".

The dancer's repertoire⁴（节目，保留剧目） was unusually diverse（不同的，相异的） and she claimed not to have a favourite part, saying "in each role I gave a little piece of my heart".

She was often partnered on stage by Vladimir Vasiliev, whom she went on to marry.

Their on stage work came to embody⁵ the Russian classical style for audiences around the world.

In 1959 they took part in the first tour of the United States the company made. Critics were delighted（高兴的，快乐的） by them and dubbed⁶ the pair the "babies of the Bolshoi".

Unusually for the Soviet⁷ era, she also worked with foreign choreographers（舞蹈指导） including Maurice Bejart and Roland Petit.

After her retirement⁸ in the 1990s, Maximova founded a charity to help former dancers who were in financial difficulties and became much in demand as a teacher.

'Great ballerina'

The dancer felt that "you must not simply be a professional teacher, you also have to be a human being, a friend".

Andrei Petrov, the artistic director of the Kremlin Ballet, where Maximova was also a teacher, paid tribute（颂词，称赞） to her gifts at leading new generations of Russian dancers.

He said: "She was a great ballerina, a teacher from God, and at the same time she was always able to speak the truth no matter how bitter it might be."

In an interview last year with Ballet magazine, Maximova was frank about the changes she had seen to ballet during her career. "There has been an aesthetic⁹（美学的） and technical change" she said.

"In the past dancers didn't need all this, they danced from their hearts and from their souls, like an actress. Now it is different and you must jump and spin; many things have changed. It is like gymnastics."

In 2008, a series of galas was held in Russia to mark the 50 year anniversary of Maximova's debut¹⁰（初次登场） with the Bolshoi.