Golden Nail Award winner

She was born in Saint Petersburg in 1972 into a theatre family.

In 1995 she graduated from the Saint Petersburg State Theatre Arts Academy (stagecraft and arts, lighting designer). In 1995-2004 Maya Shavdatuashvili worked as a Lighting Designer and an Assistant Art Director of Mariinsky theatre and took part in staging of such plays as Ghostly Ball, Nine Tango and Bach (Dmitry Bryantsev), Futile Precautions (Oleg Vinogradov) and many others. The experience that Maya Shavdatuashvili had gained during her work in Mariinsky Theatre allowed her to work and reconstruct classic Russian stage plays in such famous theatres as Royal Opera House (London), La scala (Milan), Metropolitan Opera (New York), Real Theatre (Madrid), NHK (Tokyo), Kennedy centre (Washington DC), Opera Chatle (Paris), theatres of Baden-Baden, Budapest, Shanghai and many others.

Since 2001 Shavdatuashvili has staged plays in numerous Russian theatres, namely The Vakhtangov Theatre, The Moscow Art Theatre, Modern theatre, Kremlin Ballet, New Opera, The Bryantsev Youth Theatre and Ballet on Ice (St. Petersburg), The Omsk Drama Theatre, Novosibirsk Music Theatre “The Globe”.

As a Chief Lighting Designer, Maya Shavdatuashvili used to work in such Moscow theatres as Modern and Et Cetera under the guidance of Alexander Kalyagin. Now Shavdatuashvili is a Chief Lighting Designer of The Evgeny Vakhtangov Theatre.

From 2009 – plays staged at The Vakhtangov Theatre.