{"id":1119,"date":"2015-06-02T22:58:03","date_gmt":"2015-06-02T21:58:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/?p=1119"},"modified":"2015-06-02T22:59:31","modified_gmt":"2015-06-02T21:59:31","slug":"second-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/2015\/06\/second-act.html","title":{"rendered":"Second act"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Guillem<\/a><\/p>\n

Sylvie Guillem and the changing shape of a dance career<\/strong><\/p>\n

The options for a dancer when the pli\u00e9 turns to rust have conventionally been restricted. Teacher, family or ballet mistress. Some became choreographers or artistic directors; others, it was rumoured, were lured behind the opera house with the promise of fresh pasture and sugar lumps and never heard from again.<\/p>\n

Sylvie Guillem<\/a> changed all that. The French star\u2019s choices have widened the sphere of what a dancer’s second act might look like. When she stopped performing the major classical roles in her mid-30s \u2013 rather earlier than anyone expected \u2013 she took a decisive swerve into contemporary dance. The pieces she made with Akram Khan (Sacred Monsters<\/em>), Russell Maliphant (Push)<\/em> and William Forsythe (Rearray)<\/em> are highlights of the last decade of dance.<\/p>\n

Now, at 50 \u2013 later than her predecessors might have done, yet somehow rather earlier than anyone expected \u2013 she has announced her retirement<\/a> from dance. An international tour of her farewell programme \u2013 puckishly titled Life in Progress<\/em> <\/a>\u2013 has just played in London and continues until December, where it will conclude in Tokyo.<\/p>\n

\"Guillem<\/a>

Guillem in Akram Khan’s techne from Life in Progress<\/p><\/div>\n

Life in Progress<\/em> is, seemingly, the final chapter of a dance career in which Guillem \u2013 guided by instinct, integrity and intransigence \u2013 made her own choices and followed her curiosity, parlaying a new career as muse and maker. She isn\u2019t the first dancer to find an outlet for her mature skills (Mikhail Baryshnikov<\/a> is the obvious example); but it\u2019s striking that she has done so without joining an existing organisation or forming her own company. In a profession long muted by deference, Guillem has refused to cede control of her own career.<\/p>\n

Guillem\u2019s activism is directed towards environmental charities, but she’s no union rep for ballerinas. If she has ever made a stand \u2013 against being miscast, not consulted, pigeonholed \u2013 it is because it was what she felt she needed. As Adam Cooper, her former colleague from the Royal Ballet and himself a defector from Planet Ballet, told me, in the hierarchical atmosphere of a traditional classical company, it didn\u2019t take much to appear like a stroppy renegade.<\/p>\n

Of course, few dancers enjoy Guillem\u2019s stature. Yet even on the corps-face, the notion of a second act has developed in positive ways. As the toiling tutus and sweat-gunnelled soloists now reach retirement, there is far more help available to aid their transition into something more than default teaching or the quiet hysteria of the scrapheap. The charity Dancers Career Development <\/a>is the most prominent organisation working with dancers in the UK, and encouraging them to get in touch before they retire, so that they can assess their skills and consider their options. When Sally Howard visited DCD for Dance Gazette<\/em> <\/a>last year, she found life coach Isabel Mortimer (herself a former dancer with Matthew Bourne) conducting a session and urging a ballerina to credit the qualities (dedication, collaboration, focus) that she had developed during a lifetime in stage and studio. Former dancers can become anything from florists to dry stone wallers \u2013 though they need a passion to replace the vocation of their first act.<\/p>\n

On the money<\/strong><\/p>\n

For a far more select band of star dancers, Guillem\u2019s career suggests a new route: \u00e9toile as entrepreneur, ballerina as brand. Guillem herself doesn\u2019t seem to have shaped her post-ballet life with spreadsheet-hungry strategy \u2013 rather, she has followed her own instincts, identified collaborators who will provoke and get the best out of her, and allowed the results to speak to themselves.<\/p>\n

Other leading dancers seem cannier about their choices. The stable of blue-chip international artists<\/a> who blow into American Ballet Theatre each season \u2013 including Diana Vishneva<\/a>, Natalia Osipova, Alina Cojocaru, and a new generation of male virtuosi like the Royal Ballet\u2019s Steven McRae and Vadim Muntagirov and the Maryinsky\u2019s Kimin Kim \u2013 have realised that a top-drawer career doesn\u2019t merely involve treading the cloisters of a single company, but making a name beyond its confines. Alessandra Ferri, 52, returned to the Royal Ballet this year as the central figure in Wayne McGregor\u2019s Woolf Works<\/a><\/em> \u2013 a landmark ballet because it not only casts a mature dancer but makes her questing maturity the subject of the piece.<\/p>\n

Guesting with intent is the first step towards building a brand around your unusual talent. Vishneva, who has paid tribute to Guillem\u2019s example, continues to dance with the Mariinsky but also directs her own international Context festival in Moscow and commissions new contemporary-slanting work; earlier this year, she told me that she was \u2018a role model for a generation coming after me.\u2019 Putin\u2019s Russia doesn\u2019t reverence leading dancers as did the Soviet era; on the other hand, Vishneva take control of her own career choices and, as she says, \u2018you get paid much, much more money.\u2019<\/p>\n

She, like Osipova, Ivan Vasiliev and others, is promoted by Sergei Danilian<\/a> \u2013 the genially terrifying producer behind Kings of the Dance. He\u2019s no doubt on the money, though it isn\u2019t always clear that he and his dancers are on the art. Osipova and Vasiliev\u2019s Solo for Two<\/em> programme last year was on the skimpy side; Vishneva\u2019s On the Edge<\/em> double bill edged towards diva camp, letting her stalk and glare in a silver Lagerfeld frock.<\/p>\n

Absorbed in movement<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not all of Guillem\u2019s choices met universal acclaim, but her strike rate for new work was unusually high; you can\u2019t dispute her taste or intent. On Life in Progress<\/em>, her final programme, neither Khan\u2019s scuttling force-of-nature solo nor Maliphant\u2019s russet-lit duo are exceptional pieces, though both showcase her almost casual gifts \u2013 the ease with which she lifts a leg, shapes an arm, channels intelligence and intention through every move. She closes with Mats Ek\u2019s solo Bye<\/em> (photo top<\/em> by Bill Cooper): a piece of adult seriousness and childish curiosity, absorbed in movement. When I first saw it in 2011, it seemed \u2018like watching a lonely, imaginative child at play.\u2019 As a farewell, it hints beautifully at new beginnings. Guillem will no doubt go on to find new challenges beyond dance; her successors may find that she\u2019s blazed a trail that will make their own second acts far easier.<\/p>\n

Follow David on Twitter: @mrdavidjays<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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