Goh Soo Khim, born in 1944, is one of the most respected figures in the Singapore ballet scene. The sister of Singapore ballet icons Goh Soo Nee, Goh Choo Chiat and the late Goh Choo San, Soo Khim took over the reins of the Singapore Ballet Academy in 1971 and co-founded Singapore’s first professional dance company, the Singapore Dance Theatre with the late Anthony Then in 1988. Since then, the 1981 Cultural Medallion winner has nurtured generations of successful ballet dancers, soloists and choreographers and provided them with invaluable opportunities for training and performance. She has also brought to growing local and international audiences numerous classic and contemporary works, many with Asian narratives and motifs.

Goh Soo Khim was born in 1944 in Singapore to a family with nine children, three of whom would become internationally respected ballet dancers, choreographers and teachers—her eldest brother Goh Choo Chiat, elder sister Goh Soo Nee and younger brother Goh Choo San.

She had always loved dancing from a very young age and trained in ballet at the Singapore Ballet Academy (SBA) in the 1950s and early ’60s under the tutelage of her sister Soo Nee, Vernon Martinus and Frances Poh. In 1964, Goh pursued further training in Australia and became the first Asian to be admitted to the prestigious Australia Ballet School, returning to Singapore in 1966 to perform Giselle with her brother and SBA’s then resident choreographer, Choo San, to acclaim. While still in Australia in 1969, she married her childhood sweetheart Daniel Teo whom she had known since her first year in Nanyang Primary School. Upon their subsequent return to Singapore, Goh joined her sister Soo Nee at SBA to be its principal trainer and principal dancer.

Soon after, Soo Nee left Singapore to pursue new opportunities in Canada, and Goh took over as the SBA’s director and principal in 1971. Although a talented dancer herself, she shunned a professional stage career and focused instead on grooming young dancers. She led her students to perform at many Singapore Arts Festivals and dance festivals over the years including the 1977 2nd ASEAN Radio and Television Cultural Exchange Programme where she represented Singapore. She also began creating original work, including her maiden choreographic work, Temple Tone Poem (1978), Goodbye Again (1980), and Dilemma (1982) and Five Emotions (1982), two works commissioned for and premiered at the 1982 Singapore Arts Festival. All were contemporary works that demonstrated her ability to marry Western ballet technique with relevant and contemporary Asian narratives, themes and aesthetic elements.

Another turning point in Goh’s career came in 1984 when she was appointed as co-artistic director of the Ballet Group of the National Dance Company by the Ministry of Culture. Goh created and staged Environmental Phases, which was performed by the Ballet Group at the 5th ASEAN Festival of Performing Arts, and also collaborated twice with dancer-choreographer Anthony Then to produce At the Ballet and Ballet Premiere for the Singapore Arts Festival. Then and Goh—who had since the 1960s been struck by the lack of performing opportunities for aspiring ballet dancers in Singapore—began to work towards establishing a professional dance company.

Their efforts were realised in 1988 when they co-founded the Singapore Dance Theatre (SDT), Singapore’s first professional dance company dedicated to providing a performance platform for professional ballet dancers. SDT began its life with seven dancers—three selected from the Ballet Group of the National Dance Company and four from the Southeast Asian region—and without its own premises, using the SBA’s studios. There, Goh and Then developed a repertoire of classic and contemporary works including those created and choreographed by the founders themselves.

SDT moved into its own permanent premises at Fort Canning in 1991 and in 1995, SBA became associated with SDT. By then, several SBA alumni had joined SDT as key founding members and professional dancers, and many SBA dance students performed in SDT’s full-length productions. In 1995, SDT launched Ballet Under the Stars, an annual outdoor dance performance at Fort Canning Park. Unfortunately, that same year, Then passed away in December, leaving Soo Khim to helm SDT. Thirteen years later after many successes, Soo Khim stepped down as artistic director of SDT in Dec 2008, and Janek Schergen—her brother Choo San’s longtime ballet master—replaced her.

For her outstanding achievements and contributions to the development of ballet in Singapore, Goh received the Cultural Medallion in 1981, the Pingat Bakti Masyarakat (Public Service Medal) in 1989, and a Fellowship from the LASALLE College of the Arts in 2002. She has also been honoured with invitations to sit on dance jury panels. These include the international panel for the Asia Pacific Ballet Competition in Japan, which she has been part of since 1991, and the jury for the prestigious 2003 Benois de la Danse Prix in Moscow for which she became the first Asian representative. She was also Her World magazine's Woman of the Year 2008 and in 2009, she became an international jury member for the Genée International Ballet Competition in Singapore. That same year, she was conferred a fellowship from the Royal Academy of Dance in London.

During her 20 years as artistic director of SDT, the company established itself to become one of Asia’s leading dance companies, with 22 dancers of various nationalities performing a repertoire of classical and contemporary works over six seasons in a year and touring Asia as well as Australia and other countries including France, UK, USA and Mexico. Through the years, SDT managed to develop not only a growing pool of ballet talent in Singapore, but also a growing audience.

At present, Goh sits on the board of directors of the SDT. She also remains the director and principal of the SBA, continuing to inspire and mentor younger generations of dancers. The soft-spoken grand dame of ballet currently enjoys spending time with her family, especially her six grandchildren.