principal dancer with Hamburg Ballet 1994 : Diana Vishneva, principal with Kirov Ballet and Guest Principal Artist with American Ballet Theatre, Benjamin Millepied, choreographer and principal dancer with New York City Ballet 1995 : Gonzalo Garcia, principal with New York City Ballet: youngest-ever recipient of Gold Medal, Gillian Murphy, principal with American Ballet Theatre, Le Yin, former principal dancer with Pacific Northwest Ballet, Natalia Sologub, principal with Dresden Semperoper Ballett 1996 : Marcelo Gomes, former principal with American Ballet Theatre, Ivan Putrov, former principal with The Royal Ballet, Shoko Nakamura, principal with Berlin Staatsoper 1997 : Alina Cojocaru, formerly Principal with The Royal Ballet, English National Ballet, now guest principal with Hamburg Ballet 1998 : Ekaterina Menchikh, ballerina with the Zurich Opera (Ballet Company of Heinz Spoerli) 2000 : Yao Wei, principal with the Royal Danish Ballet, Yuriko Kajiya, soloist with American Ballet Theatre 2001 : Misa Kuranaga, principal with San Francisco Ballet, Jaime Garcia Castilla, principal with San Francisco Ballet, and Ludovic Ondiviela, first artist with The Royal Ballet 2001 : Natalia de Froberville (Domratcheva), principal with Perm Opera and Ballet Theatre and former principal with Kiev Ballet, National Opera of Ukraine 2002 : Maria Kochetkova, principal with the San Francisco Ballet and Yuhui Choe, first soloist with The Royal Ballet 2003 : Steven McRae, principal with The Royal Ballet and Hee Seo, principal with American Ballet Theatre 2004 : Alex Wong, former principal soloist with the Miami City Ballet 2005 : Jin Young Won 2005 : Yujin Kim, principal with Alonzo King Lines Ballet 2006 : Sergei Polunin, formerly principal dancer with The Royal Ballet 2007 : Sae Eun Park, étoile with the Paris Opera Ballet 2008 : Aleix Martinez, soloist with the Hamburg Ballet 2009 : Hannah O'Neill, première danseuse with the Paris Opera Ballet 2010 : Cristian Emanuel Amuchastegui, corps de ballet with the Hamburg Ballet 2011 : Mayara Magri, principal dancer with The Royal Ballet 2012 : Madoka Sugai, principal dancer Hamburg Ballet 2013 : Adhonay Silva, principal dancer with the Stuttgart Ballet 2014 : Haruo Niyama 2015 : Harrison Lee, dancer in the Aud Jebsen Young Dancers Program at The Royal Ballet 2016 : Yu Hang, dancer in the Aud Jebsen Young Dancers Program at The Royal Ballet 2017 : Michele Esposito, élève with the Dutch National Ballet 2018 : Shale Wagman, first year artist with the English National Ballet 2019 : Mackenzie Brown,