Swiss based choreographer Ihsan Rustem was born in London, where he trained at the Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Dance.

In 2020, he co-founded the Swiss dance company Cie. La Ronde with Cathy Marston, which he led until 2025. From 2015 to 2025, he served as Resident Choreographer at NW Dance Project in Portland, Oregon (USA), and has created 14 works for the company since 2010.

Rustem’s choreography has been commissioned by a wide range of international companies, including:
Nederlands Dans Theater 2, Les Ballets Jazz de Montréal, São Paulo City Ballet, National Ballet of Chile, Ballet Moscow, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago 2, Zurich Ballet, Istanbul State Ballet MDT, Tanz Luzerner Theater, Bern Ballet, Konzert Theater St. Gallen, Whim W’Him Seattle, Sacramento Ballet, Dance Aspen, Ballet Edmonton, Junior Ballet Antwerp, Ballare Carmel, Ballett Augsburg, Thüringer Staatsballett, Staatstheater Braunschweig Tanztheater, Kazan State Opera and Ballet, Koblenz Ballet, Ballet Regensburg, Würzburg Ballet, Siberian State Ballet, Salt Contemporary Dance, Repertory Dance Theater Utah, Staatstheater Cottbus, Staatstheater Schwerin, Arts Umbrella Dance Company Vancouver, Moving Arts Cincinnati, National Youth Dance Company, Palucca Hochschule Dresden, Codarts, ZHdK, Tanzwerk101, Taipei National University of the Arts, and the Rambert School. He was also a featured choreographer on the Russian TV program The Bolshoi Ballet.

In 2018/19, Nederlands Dans Theater named Rustem one of their Up & Coming Choreographers.

His work has received numerous accolades:

• State of Matter won the 2012 Sadler’s Wells Global Dance Contest and the Public Prize at the 25th International Competition for Choreographers Hannover

• Carmen received Dance Magazine’s 2017 Readers' Choice Award for Best Collaboration

• In 2014, he was awarded Hubbard Street Dance Chicago's International Commissioning Project

Rustem is the former Director of Ballettschule Luzern and has served on the jury of several prestigious competitions, including the Prix de Lausanne (2021), Concorso Internazionale di Danza Città di Rieti, and the Dance World Cup.

From 2000 to 2014, Ihsan danced with Ballet Theater Munich, Introdans, State Theater Bern Ballet, Tanz Luzerner Theater, and Adventures in Motion Pictures. He created roles in works by Wayne McGregor, Hofesh Shechter, Alexander Ekman, Matthew Bourne, Stijn Celis, Patrick Delcroix, Cayetano Soto, Felix Landerer, and Cathy Marston, and performed works by Mats Ek, Jiří Kylián, Paul Lightfoot & Sol León, Hans van Manen, and William Forsythe, among others.

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Aside from his work as a choreographer, he is also part of the curation team for Switzerland's Steps Festival and is a guest teacher at the Zurich University of the Arts.

He currently lives in Zurich, Switzerland.

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