Van Patten was born in Boston. She started with ballet, tap and jazz, and later focused on ballet. Van Patten trained at Boston Ballet and began performing at age 8 in their annual performance of The Nutcracker. She later switched to Ballet Workshop of New England and performed at Massachusetts Youth Ballet under Jacqueline Cronsberg. Van Patten also learned some of George Balanchine's works, such as Serenade and Apollo under the direction of Cronsberg's daughter, Sandra Jennings, who danced at the New York City Ballet. Van Patten attended school at Newton Country Day School of the Sacred Heart and spent her summers studying with Jean-Pierre Bonnefeux, Violette Verdy, and Patricia McBride at the Chautauqua Institution.
Career
When Van Patten was 15, Jennings recommended her to audition for the Royal Danish Ballet in Copenhagen, which was co-directed by Jennings' former colleague, Colleen Neary. Van Patten was offered an apprenticeship and was one of the few foreign dancers in the company. Three months later, she was chosen by choreographer John Neumeier to dance the opening night cast in a revival of his Romeo and Juliet, with Mads Blangstrup, a principal, as her Romeo. She turned 16 shortly before she debuted the role. In 2001, at age 17, Van Patten became a member of the corps de ballet, thus became the youngest dancer to receive a contract in the company's history. Later that year, she joined the San Francisco Ballet as a soloist, after meeting Helgi Tomasson, the director of the company, when he was staging his version of The Sleeping Beauty in Copenhagen. Van Patten became a principal dancer in 2007. Her repertoire include lead roles such as Odette/Odile in Swan Lake, the title role in Giselle, the title role in The Little Mermaid and Tatiana in Onegin. She had also originated such as in Justin Peck's Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, Cathy Marston's Snowblind, Arthur Pita's Björk Ballet and Christopher Wheeldon's Within a Golden Hour, and danced the role of Stepsister Edwina in the North American premiere of Wheeldon's Cinderella, which was a co-production with Dutch National Ballet. She performed at galas in Europe and Australia.
Selected repertoire
Van Patten's repertoire wit San Francisco Ballet and other companies includes:
Isadora Duncan Dance Award for Best Ensemble Performance, 2009
Isadora Duncan Dance Special Award for "Many Faces of Giselle", 2012
Personal life
Van Patten, who did not attend high school, took her GED exam after she returned to the United States and started taking college classes afterwards. Van Patten is married and has a son.
