Ballets Russes

The Ballets Russes (French for The Russian Ballets) was an itinerant ballet company which performed under the directorship of Sergei Diaghilev between 1909 and 1929. They performed in many countries, including England, the U.S.A., and Spain. Many of the company's dancers originated from the Imperial Ballet of Saint Petersburg. Younger dancers were trained in Paris, within the community of exiles after the Russian Revolution of 1917. The company featured and premiered now-famous (and sometimes notorious) works by the great choreographers Marius Petipa and Michel Fokine, as well as new works by Bronislava Nijinska, Léonide Massine, Vaslav Nijinsky, and the young George Balanchine at the start of his career.

Ballet Russes by August Macke, 1912

Brief history

Ballets Russes poster, 1911

The company's productions, which combined new dance, art and music, created a huge sensation around the world, altering the course of musical history, bringing many significant visual artists into the public eye, and completely reinvigorating the art of performing dance. The Ballets Russes was one of the most influential theatre companies of the twentieth century, in part because of its ground-breaking artistic collaboration among contemporary choreographers, composers, artists, and dancers. Its ballets have been variously interpreted as Classical, Neo-Classical, Romantic, Neo-Romantic, Avant-Garde, Expressionist, Abstract, and Orientalist. The influence of the Ballets Russes lasts to this day in one form or another.

Sergei Diaghilev acted as an "impresario" or organizer of the Ballet Russes, rather than a dancer or an artist. He was wealthy and studied to be a lawyer. He formed the Pickwick Club with Benois and Bakst, and together, the three published World of Art. They believed that "art is free, life is paralyzed." Their ideas of developing a Russian art led to the creation of the Ballet Russes.

After Diaghilev's early death in 1929, the dancers scattered, and the company's property was claimed by creditors. Colonel Wassily de Basil and his associate René Blum revived the company under the name Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. Balanchine and Massine worked with them as choreographers, and Tamara Toumanova worked with them as a principal dancer. De Basil and Blum argued constantly, so Blum founded another company under the name Original Ballet Russe.

After World War II began, the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo left Europe and toured extensively in the United States. As dancers retired and left the company, they often founded dance studios in the United States or South America, or taught at other dancers' studios. With Balanchine's founding of the School of American Ballet, and later New York City Ballet, many outstanding former Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo dancers went to New York to teach.

The Original Ballet Russe toured mostly in Europe. Its alumni were influential in teaching classical Russian ballet technique in European and British schools.

Russian stamp: Sergei Diaghilev

The Company's genesis

The Ballets Russes was an offshoot from the Russian Mir iskusstva (World of Art) movement. The World of Art, led by Alexandre Benois, had mainly occupied itself with painting exhibitions and the publication of a culture magazine. Benois and his circle conceived the idea of bringing Russian nationalist opera to Paris in 1907. They were warmly received there, and plans were laid for another season the following year. In 1908, the group presented a mixture of opera and ballet in Paris, and enjoyed riotous success, particularly in the latter art form. They thereafter presented mainly ballets. By the time the group returned to Paris in 1909 for the first 'official' Ballets Russes shows, Diaghilev had firmly taken the reins from Benois (though the latter continued to work for Diaghilev for some years afterwards).

Characteristics/Reforms

1. The male dancer returns.
2. Expressiveness: work was not just about technique or divertisements as found in classical ballet
3. Movement vocabulary freed
4. Individuals were important rather than a corps
5. Unified theme: pieces were often one act, and always sought to express a single theme throughout the piece
6. Collaboration: Choreographers and dancers collaborated with set designers and musicians in order to create pieces
7. Reflection of Russian taste, themes (idea of developing own Russian art, rather than importing western art and influence)

Dance

The Ballets Russes was noted for the high standard of its dancers, which contributed a great deal to its success in Paris, where dance technique had declined a great deal since the 1830s. Most of the company's dancers were resident at the Russian Imperial Theatres in the early years, and were merely taken on loan by Diaghilev to Paris during the theatres' long summer holidays.

During the course of the company's life, the female dancers included Anna Pavlova, Tamara Karsavina, Olga Spessivtseva, Mathilde Kschessinska, Ida Rubinstein, Bronislava Nijinska, Lydia Lopokova, Diana Gould and Alicia Markova, among many others.

The company was, however, more remarkable for raising the status of the male dancer, who had been largely ignored by choreographers and ballet audiences since the early nineteenth century. Among the male dancers were Michel Fokine, Serge Lifar, Léonide Massine, George Balanchine, Valentin Zeglovsky, Adolphe Bolm, and the legendary Vaslav Nijinsky who was, far and away, the most popular and talented dancer in the company's history.

The three most significant choreographers of the company were (in chronological order) Fokine, Nijinsky, and Massine.

Mikhail Fokine

Fokine (1880–1942) caused the rebirth of classical dramatic dance (though his works often included Expressionist elements). Many regard his greatest work to be Petrushka; others consider it to be Les Sylphides. Fokine also choreographed The Dying Swan, Prince Igor, and Scheherazade. Fokine graduated from the Imperial Ballet School in 1898, and eventually became First Soloist at the Mariinsky Theater.

Fokine created his first piece of choreography, entitled Pavillion d'Armide for the Imperial Russian Ballet In 1907. That same year he also created Chopiniana, a piece with music by Frédéric Chopin. This work serves as an early example of creating choreography to an already existing score rather than to music specifically written for the ballet (a dramatic departure at the time.)

Fokine established his reputation while he was Chief Choreographer for Serge Diaghilev's first ballet seasons in the West. Diaghilev gave Fokine the opportunity to break away from the academic form of late 19th century ballet and implement his reforms. Among his most famous ballets created for the Ballets Russes were the Polovtsian Dances from Prince Igor, Les Sylphides, Le Spectre de la Rose and Petrouchka.

Vaslav Nijinsky

Nijinsky (1888–1959) danced as a young man at the Mariinsky Theater, where he was a huge success. In 1912 he began his career as a choreographer. He created several works for Diaghilev's Ballet Russes during his career. He is sometimes thought of as the father of Expressionist Dance. His most influential works were the innovative L'Apres-midi d'un Faune and The Rite of Spring. Nijinsky collaborated with Stravinsky for Le Sacre du Printemps in 1913 (also known as The Rite of Spring), as well as set designer Roerich. Millicent Hodson and Kenneth Archer have since reconstructed the piece, including sets and costumes, and set it on the Joffrey Ballet. This piece was very controversial in Nijinsky's time, since many had never heard music like Stravinsky's. As a result, many people in the theater on opening night revolted. Nijinsky eventually retired from dance and was diagnosed with schizophrenia.

Leonide Massine

Leonide Massine was born in Moscow in 1896. He studied both acting and dancing at the Imperial School in Moscow. Massine had almost decided to become an actor when Sergey Diaghilev, seeking a replacement for Vaslav Nijinsky, invited Massine to join his company. Diaghilev really encouraged Massine's creativity.

Massine (1895–1979) was a less inventive choreographer; his works are sometimes called Neo-Classical. Massine choreographed works such as Le Tricorne and Parade. In Parade, the visual was paramount. Massine collaborated with Pablo Picasso for this work. Picasso was the set designer and designed sets in the style of cubism. Massine also employed jazz music in Parade.

Massine extended Michel Fokine's choreographic reforms- he worked on narration and characterizations. His ballets incorporated both folk dance and demi-charactere dance. This is a style that uses classical technique to perform character dance. He created contrasts in his choreography such as synchronized yet individual movement, or small-group dance patterns within the corps de ballet.

Others

Other choreographers of note included Serge Lifar and Nijinsky's sister, Bronislava, who created at least one masterpiece in the form of Les Noces. Balanchine choreographed Apollon musagète and Le fils prodigue for the company.

Music

Diaghilev secured the employment of many great music composers for his ballets. This served to distinguish his ballets from many nineteenth-century ballets, for which the music had usually been provided by less inspired composers such as Drigo, Minkus, and Pugni.

Diaghilev commissioned many original scores, and borrowed freely from the existing musical canon. His ballets included music by artists such as Debussy, Milhaud, Poulenc, Prokofiev, Ravel, Satie, Respighi, Igor Stravinsky and Richard Strauss.

Igor Stravinsky

The most notable of Diaghilev's composers was Igor Stravinsky, who is now recognised as the premier composer of the early twentieth century. Diaghilev had hired the young Stravinsky at a time when he was virtually unknown to compose the music for The Firebird, after the composer Anatoly Lyadov proved unreliable. Diaghilev was thus instrumental in launching Stravinsky's career in Europe and the United States of America.

Stravinsky's early ballet scores were the subject of much discussion. The Firebird (1910) was seen as an astonishingly accomplished work for such a young artist (Debussy is said to have remarked drily: "Well, you've got to start somewhere!"). Many contemporary audiences found Petrushka (1911) to be almost unbearably dissonant and confused. "The Rite of Spring" nearly caused an audience riot. It stunned people because of its willful rhythms and aggressive dynamics. The Rite of Spring had to be pulled after just a few performances. The audience's negative reaction to it is now regarded as a theatrical scandal as notorious as the failed runs of Richard Wagner's Tannhäuser at Paris in 1861 and Jean-Georges Noverre's and David Garrick's Chinese Ballet at London on the eve of the Seven Years' War. However, Stravinsky's early ballet scores are now widely considered masterpieces of the genre. Even his later ballet scores (such as Apollo), while not as startling, were still superior to most ballet music of the previous century.

Art and design

Firebird, 1910

The company invited the collaboration of rising contemporary fine artists in the design of sets and costumes. These included Benois himself, Bakst, Braque, Gontcharova, Larionov, Picasso, Chanel, Matisse, Derain, Miró, de Chirico, Dalí, Bilibin, Tchelitchev, Utrillo, Nicholas Roerich, and Rouault. Their designs contributed to the groundbreaking excitement of the company's productions.

Leon Bakst

Leon Bakst, one of the most important designers for the Ballet Russe, was born in Grodno on May 10, 1866. Aiding Diaghilev with the formation of Ballet Russe, Bakst assumed the role of artistic director. His sets and costumes brought him wide recognition. He is most noted for the sets and costumes for Scheherazade (1910), Firebird (1910), Le Spectre de la Rose (1911). He designed for Ballet Russe from 1909-1921.

Pablo Picasso

Pablo Picasso designed Parade in 1917 for the Ballet Russe. Parade was the first ballet to include cubism sets and costumes.

Natalia Goncharova

Natalia Goncharova was born in 1881 near Tula, Russia. Her art was inspired by Russian folk art, fauvism, and cubism. She began designing for the Ballet Russe in 1921.

Although the Ballets Russes firmly established the twentieth-century tradition of fine art theatre design, the company was not unique in its employment of fine artists. For instance, Savva Mamontov's Private Opera Company had made a policy of employing fine artists, such as Korovin and Golovin, who went on to work for the Ballets Russes.

Principal productions

See also categories: Ballets Russes productions and Category of Ballets Russes productions

Scene from Apollon musagète, 1928. Dancers: Serge Lifar, Danilova, Chernysheva, Dubrovska, Petrova.

References

• Garafola, Lynn (1989). Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. New York: Oxford UP. 
• Purvis, Alston (2009). The Ballets Russes and the Art of Design. New York: The Monacelli Press. 
• [1] Michel Fokine ABT website
• [2] Ballet Russe Cultural Partnership website
• Garafola, Lynn (1999). The Ballet Russe and its world. New Haven: Yale University Press. 
• Anderson, Jack (1992). Ballet and Modern Dance: A concise history. New Jersey: Princeton Book Company. 
• [3] Classical Net's website (Igor Stravinsky's biography)
• [4] The History of Diaghilev's Ballets Russes 1909-1929
• [5] Leon Bakst website
• [6] Leonide Massine Biography
• [7] Vaslav Nijinky Biography

Notes

External links

• "Ballets Russes", online exhibition and presentation.
• Danza Ballet: Especial The Ballet Russes
• Ballet Russes (2005), documentary covering the history of the Ballets Russes, Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo and Original Ballet Russe from the former's inception through the latter's end, featuring many interviews with surviving dancers of the company — IMDB listing
• From Russia with love: costumes from the Ballets Russes, 1909-1933, an online exhibition featuring material from the collection of the National Gallery of Australia
• « Centenary of Ballets Russians of Diaghilev »[8] - two postage stamps of Monaco, created by Georgy Shishkin(Gueorgui Chichkine)
• "Monte Carlo and the Ballets Russes"
• Australia Dancing — Ballets Russes Australian tours, 1936 - 1940
• [9] Russian Ballet History: Diahilev's artists

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