“The ballet world, desperate for an heir to Balanchine and Robbins, tends to deify bright young men, and as it tries to puff Justin Peck up, he seems determined to stay firmly on the ground, so to speak.”
“I am convinced that choreography is not only the best [art] form to buy a ticket for, it is also an orchestration of encounters, the setting up of encounters between different minds,” she said. “I hope we give audiences the possibility to enter the choreography themselves, but also to intellectually stimulate the publics we encounter, more than just satisfy them and try to do it very gently, not aggressively.”
Says the choreographer about Ballet 422, Jody Lee Lipes’s new documentary about the creation of Peck’s first dance for his colleagues at New York City Ballet, “I was actually a little bit surprised by how young I look in it. I felt like I was watching this kid stand in front of the room and make a ballet.”
“When she came across Kathak, the staccato rhythms of the dance form reminded [choreographer Helena] Waldmann of the rapid needle of a sewing machine. She saw the stomping footwork of Kathak as the perfect symbol of the pressures faced by garment workers.”
“The Royal Ballet principal Natalia Osipova and contemporary dancer Jonathan Goddard become the first to win in both major dancer categories, while Carlos Acosta takes home the lifetime achievement honours.”
“Northumbria University conducted a study about the male dance moves that are attractive to women. Now you won’t have to think twice the next time you go to a wedding. Just take a look at the science.” (video)
“The pair do not subscribe to Australia’s old ‘cultural cringe'; they are living proof of what the country is capable of artistically. But asked how they would improve Australia, they answer immediately and in unison: ‘More money to the arts.'”
“This is not choreography for the faint of heart. Tethered by harnesses and ropes, belayed by riggers from above, the dancers engage in constant risk management, watching for jagged surfaces, crumbling sandstone beneath their feet and the ever-present threat of rope snarls.”
“While art museums have dabbled in live performance since the 1960s, ‘the real estate has changed,’ said the choreographer Ralph Lemon … ‘Museums are now offering performance spaces beyond just the gardens and basements and unannounced hallways.’ The trend is proving a sure way to drive up traffic.”
“Kate Champion, artistic director of Force Majeure, and Kelli Jean Drinkwater, associate artist and fat activist, talk about the company’s new show featuring big-bodied performers. Nothing to Lose is ‘driven by dance’, says Champion, but also draws on the dancers’ real-life experiences to challenge preconceptions and reclaim a performance space for large bodies.” (video)
Choreographer Patrick Scully, who has already done a similar project in Germany, hopes to get a cast of 100 kayaks, racing sculls, motorboats, paddleboards, and maybe even a barge to perform a work on the river in the Twin Cities this summer. (No sailboats, though.)
Sports fans and viral video mavens have seen the haka, the traditional pre-battle dance that New Zealand’s national sports teams (most notably, rugby’s formidable All-Blacks) do on the field before a match. Now the clever Kiwis have figured out how to do the haka on skates. (video)
“Male and female roles are clearly defined in Pakistan, and transgender people often face harassment and abuse. One role where they are tolerated is as dancers at weddings and other celebrations at which men and women are strictly segregated. In between the dancing and showers of rupee notes, they must fend off groping from drunken guests.”
Advice from a ballet master at Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo.
“‘Now you get into the heart of the choreography challenge,’ Scully said. ‘You can’t teach a sailboat to do a cartwheel.'”
“While major ballet companies usually have plenty of dancers who fully deserve the title of ballerina, most don’t boast more than one or two who will define their generation and redefine its accomplishments. “
“Forster and Kamino’s vision speaks to a larger debate on dance creation that pits the Canadian model against its European counterpart”
“There’s been heated disagreement over the past week about what’s right and wrong. Is the rocket-propelled ex-Bolshoi enfant terrible Ivan Vasiliev ‘right’ for Swan Lake? Is English National Ballet right to accept such huge thighs in this of all classics, when the sizeist cohorts of the Russian establishment always said nyet to the sturdy, forceful Belarussian?”
“Being 47 years old, what can I still do, and feel potent and active and alive and challenged?” says the recently retired NY City Ballet principal. “There’s plenty out there, it’s just a matter of making it happen.”
“The Bolt,” choreographed in 1931 by Fyodor Lopukhov to a score by Shostakovich, with designs by Tatiana Bruni, has a strange history. Despite an unimpeachable narrative – an idle saboteur plans to throw a bolt into factory machinery but is prevented from doing so by worthy workers – the ballet was banned after one performance.”
“Men’s ballet technique, unlike women’s, finds its expression in short bursts of extreme but controlled athleticism. … There are so many things to think about at once: the position of the feet, the torque of the turns, the composure of the upper body, the shifting gaze, the placement of the arms.” Marina Harss watches one master, Ethan Stiefel, pass on secrets to ABT up-and-comer Calvin Royal.
“I’ve tried to do some hip hop and it is so difficult. You need so many things to be able to do hip hop – extraordinary strength and ability. … Asian dance, with the arms especially, couldn’t be more similar to classical ballet: those emphases on the tiniest amount of detail, just where a finger is.”
“If you’re inferring that there is racism in America, it’s not just a black problem, it’s everybody’s problem. For me it’s important that a company looks like the world, or at least reflects its community. Which you don’t see. I hire people based on their talent, and in 30 years this company has looked like everything.”
Animation dance is “a sub-category of popping [a hip-hop subgenre] that combines a range of skills like strobing, robotics and gliding, and claims inspiration from film animation in its use of splashy dramatic poses and jerky, freeze-frame dynamic.”
The Kandyan and Ruhunu forms of the genre do have similarities with India’s Bharata Natyam: “The body is held squarely upright in a vertical axis, holding a tight bend in the lifted elbows and knees, the foundation for intricate footwork patterns and expressive, flowering hand gestures. Repetition and sharpness of movement is a central feature of this ritualistic style.” (includes video)
“‘There are many people who have come with their wives who wouldn’t go to the (Sydney) Opera House or the State Theatre in Melbourne,’ says Artistic Director David McAllister. ‘Interestingly this is something that can change people’s minds, and it’s a great relationship-building exercise”
Michaela DePrince saw an image of a ballerina in a glossy magazine in the orphanage. “I didn’t know what she was, but I thought that this beautiful creature was something I’d never seen before. She looked happy, and I wanted to be happy.”
“Experts say the physically strenuous and mentally challenging pastime can improve vitality and provide a social outlet for older adults.”
David Jays: “Two decades on, Croce appears stranded on the wrong side of history. Artists bringing personal histories to the table are now mainstream. You see ‘victim art’ in reality TV and verbatim theatre; in the work of oversharing visual artists like Tracey Emin and Ryan Trecartin; and, increasingly, you see it in dance, where an immaculate body and blank-slate persona are no longer the invariable starting point.”
“Q; Have dancers changed over these 42 years in the way they learn and the way they dance? A: The work ethic is different. They’re required to do so much now, in such a short time. We don’t have the luxury of work weeks. … I find them burning out a little more often than it should be happening. But I leave, and I come back, and I’m amazed how good this company is from top to bottom.”