La Fille mal gardée. The Royal Ballet. Digital Season 2020 (and some memories)

I had the pleasure recently of watching, via its digital streaming season, a performance by the Royal Ballet of Frederick Ashton’s La Fille mal gardée. It featured Marianela Nuñez as Lise and Carlos Acosta as Colas and dates back to 2005. The partnership between Nuñez and Acosta was technically outstanding and delightful from the point of view of the interactions between the two dancers. Ashton’s choreography, of course, was full of beautiful and often unexpected movements, including his constant use of epaulement; and scenes that I relished seeing again—the storm scene for example, with the cast rushing hither and thither was quite absorbing.

Below is a link to the Act I Pas de ruban.

But the production also brought back memories of some other productions I had seen, and some wider contextual issues that have arisen over the years.

Memories of Fille

Paris Opera Ballet

Perhaps the most memorable production I have seen was a performance by the Paris Opera Ballet in 2009. It happened on 14 July, the French national day, so there were one or two moments before and during that performance where that significance of that day was not forgotten. Here is a link to the review I wrote.

A thoughtful young man

On a contextual issue, I am curious about the image below from an Australian Ballet performance of Fille during the 1970s. Who is the young man standing there looking thoughtful? I have my suspicions! The image was taken by Walter Stringer and is part of his collection held in the National Library in Canberra. Sadly, the colour is fading, or changing, and I have had to put a filter on it so that the face of the dancer is a little clearer.

Dancers in a 1970s Australian Ballet production of *La Fille mal gardée*. Photo: Walter Stringer. National Library of Australia

(Update on the photograph above: Confirming my suspicion, those who know suggest the thoughtful young man is Graeme Murphy).

Alan Alder

And on another contextual issue, I recently made a timed summary of an oral history interview I did with Alan Alder back in 1999. The interview and its summary will shortly go online. In the meantime, below I have posted a short (1 min 12 secs) excerpt from the interview.

Alder was well-known for his portrayal of Alain, Lise’s rich but slightly unusual suitor in Fille, both during his time with the Royal Ballet and later with the Australian Ballet. The role was created by Ashton on Alexander Grant, and later the role was taken on by Donald Britton. But due to circumstances, which Alder explains in the interview, while with the Royal Ballet’s touring company Alder took over the role from Britton. On one occasion, when the touring company was in Edinburgh, Ashton decided to take a trip from London to see how Alder was handling the role. In the brief extract below Alder speak of Ashton’s reaction.

David Vaughan

The production by the Royal also brought back memories of my late colleague David Vaughan, former archivist for the Merce Cunningham company and author of Frederick Ashton and his Ballets. Cunningham and Ashton were the two choreographers Vaughan admired most of all (although some correspondence I had with him shortly before he died suggests that, had he lived on, he would have added Alexei Ratmansky to that list). But I often wondered what he considered were the characteristics of Cunningham and Ashton that drew him towards these two choreographers. Did he see similarities in their approaches to choreography? Sadly, I never asked and now I will never know.

Michelle Potter, 16 June 2020

Featured image: Marianela Nuñez and Carlos Acosta in La Fille mal gardée. The Royal Ballet, 2005. Photo: © Bill Cooper/ROH

Dancers of Australian Dance Theatre in 'Devolution', 2006. Photo: © Chris Herzfeld/Camlight Productions

Devolution. Australian Dance Theatre. ADAPT Season 2020

The first thing I did after watching Garry Stewart’s Devolution (created in 2006) was go to the dictionary to check exactly what ‘devolution’ meant. In its most straight forward meaning, the dictionary (The Macquarie Dictionary is my go-to hard copy source) says ‘the transfer or delegation of power or authority’. But it appears to have a biological meaning, that is ‘degeneration, retrograde evolution’. Both are interesting, or perhaps relevant, with regard to Devolution. Looking on the list of credits, too, Stewart lists Steve Griffiths as ‘Biology Consultant’.

Looking at the work, however, it is impossible not to be instantly overwhelmed by the huge mechanical devices that populate the stage space—robotic structures created by Louis-Philippe Demers. They lurch forward and backward, up and down, and often dominate the choreography (or the choreography for humans that is). Some smaller structures take over the humans somewhat and become prosthetic appendages, although that they need to be attached to a cable hooked up to something backstage limits the dancing possibilities and detracts from the overall image they generate when attached to a dancer.

Tim Ohl in *Devolution*. Australian Dance Theatre, 2006. Photo: © Chris Herzfeld/Camlight Productions

As for performances by the human dancers, it is in the mode we have come to expect from Stewart. The dancers have no fear (or so it seems) as they throw themselves through the air and fall the the floor, only to get up again and continue their adventurous foray through space. Daring physicality is the hallmark of the dancing. We also see headstands held for a long time, and an incredible solo that is a series of variations while in a backbend. It’s extreme movement to put it mildly.

Costumes by Georg Meyer-Wiel someteimes had the dancers looking like insects given that the material was layered, shell-like and protective, although they also revealed the dancers’ backsides. No protection there.

But what of the connections between people and robots? What of devolution? Who is delegating power to whom? What is the biological process? Are the humans falling into some kind of degenerative state as the robotic structures march forward? I didn’t see Devolution during its premiere season so it was an experience to see it during this streaming season. But it isn’t my favourite piece by Stewart.

The most gentle aspect of Devolution came from video artist Gina Czarnecki with her beautiful images that floated through the space at the beginning and end of the work. They looked initially to me like abstractions of dancers’ limbs, but later they seemed more like the insects that were suggested by the dancers’ costumes. Whatever, they had a calming effect.

I watched Devolution between streamings of Giselle from the Australian Ballet and La Fille mal gardée by the Royal Ballet. Such different ends of the dance spectrum!

Michelle Potter, 13 June 2020

Featured image: Dancers of Australian Dance Theatre in Devolution, 2006. Photo: © Chris Herzfeld/Camlight Productions

Libby-Rose Niederer in a moment from her 'Arohanui'

60 dancers: 60 stories. Queensland Ballet. Week 1

Art must prevail

In something of a pioneering move, Queensland Ballet has set up a project called 60 dancers: 60 stories to manage the COVID-19 situation. It is in part a fund raising move and a field requesting donations is present at various stages—and why not? The arts have been badly hit in more ways than one and 60 dancers: 60 stories is Queensland Ballet’s pledge to its dancers and other personnel to keep working as hard as possible to keep everyone employed for as long as possible—’to keep the magic alive’.

But the project also has a strong creative underpinning. In the company’s 60th year, Queensland Ballet has asked its 60 dancers to choreograph and film a short dance work (most are between 2 and 3 minutes) to screen to audiences. Each day in the month of June, two of these creations are being released via the company’s website. Week one has just finished and the variety, in terms of choreography, approach to the theme of love, filming techniques, use of music, pretty much everything, has been astonishing. ‘Art must prevail’ is part of the introductory text. And so it must, and does with this project.

I have truly enjoyed watching every one of the 14 works screened in the first week, although one work really stood out for me—Libby-Rose Niederer’s Arohanui. Niederer is a New Zealander by birth and initial training and joined Queensland Ballet in 2017 as a Jette Parker Young Artist. She is currently a Company Artist. In her introductory text to Arohanui she writes:

Aroha is Maori for ‘love’ and Arohanui loosely translates to ‘big love’ meaning beyond that for a person or community. This word describes how I feel towards nature, especially the wild beauty of my homeland Aotearoa. It reminds me to live life in gratefulness and with amazement for the natural world which brings me love and joy.

Arohanui takes place outdoors (as you might expect from Niederehr’s comments)—in a beautiful fern-filled forest, which you can see in the featured image to this post; on an isolated beach; in the entrance/exit to a large rock-cave; and amazingly on a stony stretch between land and water. Niederer’s performance is magic from the moment we see her unfold her leg to the side while using the trunk of a tree as a barre. Her body just flows along with the Puccini music she has chosen and every step is filled with joy and beauty.

I also enjoyed the camera work in Prelude danced by Lucy Green and Sam Packer to music composed and played by Peter Wilson. There were some lovely camera angles and fade-in/fade-out moments.

Lucy Green and Sam Packer in a moment from *Prelude*

Then there was a sophisticated piece, Caricias, from Yanela Piñera and Camilo Ramos and a rather jaunty work, En-counter, from Kohei Iwamoto and Isabella Swietlicki. But these are simply my preferences and I take nothing away from the artists of Queensland Ballet who have given so much.

If you log in to the website to watch, don’t miss the quite fascinating item I love to turn, which is inspired by Li Cunxin’s pirouette coaching classes. It begins with a dancer showing a very carefully prepared and executed single pirouette. Then follows a variety of turns, multiple turns, from several dancers finishing with Li demonstrating his ‘Unvingtuple’. But don’t switch off before you have read the concluding credits.

I’m looking forward to next week’s surprises. The link to ‘60 dancers: 60 stories’ is here.

Michelle Potter, 7 June 2020

Featured image: Libby-Rose Niederer in a moment from Arohanui

Chrissy Kokiri_of New Zealand Dance Company. Photo: ©John McDermott

New Directions at New Zealand Dance Company

Comment by J ennifer Shennan

The proposed Bubble between Australia and New Zealand for health, travel and trade purposes sits comfortably on the Anzac matrix in our common history. There’s a long weave of dance exchanges and interactions between Australia and New Zealand over many decades—tours from the 1950s by the Melbourne-based National Theatre Ballet of the first full-length Swan Lake here (with Lynne Golding and Henry Danton); the years of Borovansky visits; the Australian Ballet; Sydney Dance Company; productions mounted on New Zealand Ballet by Peggy van Praagh, Ray Powell, Jonathan Taylor, Graeme Murphy; the major directorship of the Company by Harry Haythorne; Douglas Wright works in Sydney Dance Company—and numerous other visits and exchanges in both directions—most recently by New Zealand Dance Company.

The appointment of the new directors to NZDC, including Australian James O’Hara, thus has an inbuilt thread which could see further weaving between performers and audiences in the trans-Tasman Bubble.

Chances to view the global wealth of streamed dance videos has been most welcome during Lockdown but all of us are surely looking forward to the introduction of live performances in the not-too-distant future. Safe lift-off to the new team at NZDC.

An excerpt from the media release announcing the changes is below.

THE NEW ZEALAND DANCE COMPANY APPOINTS WORLD CLASS NEW LEADERSHIP TEAM
The Board of the New Zealand Dance Advancement Trust today announced the appointment of former Nederlands Dans Theater chief executive Janine Dijkmeijer as The New Zealand Dance Company’s (NZDC) Executive Director; and renowned dance artists and directors Victoria (Tor) Colombus and James O’Hara, as Co-Artistic Directors.

Board Chair Sharon van Gulik welcomed the new team saying the company was well placed for its next phase of development, building on the incredible artistic and organisational legacy of cofounder and former Chief Executive/Artistic Director, Shona McCullagh.

“The Trust was founded on the ambition of creating a full-time contemporary dance company for New Zealand by bringing together a high-calibre community of dancers, creative collaborators, arts managers and supporters dedicated to creating inspiring new dance. In appointing Janine, Tor and James, we believe we now have the talent to grow the artform of contemporary dance, and take the company into its next era”, van Gulik says.

Janine Dijkmeijer, currently living in the Netherlands as an advisor in the performing arts, say one of her missions in life is to be an advocate for the language of dance.

“I come from a family of researchers, innovators and doctors. I understand why I have come to be passionate about dance, because dance is deeply healing and always tells a true story. This language is nonviolent and global. Communicating through dance is playful and is never judgmental. The New Zealand Dance Company is a jewel. I have known Shona through her films and it feels we are family. Shona’s wide vision of what is possible within dance and communication has always been close to me. I have seen the company perform in the Netherlands and always been impressed with the high quality of dancers. I’m very much looking forward to working with the new artistic directors and the team in New Zealand – the possibilities are unlimited”, she says.

The new NZDC team: (l-r ) Janine Dijkmeijer (Executive Director), Tor Columbus (Co-artistic Director) and James O’Hara (Co-artistic Director)

The full media release, which includes further news and biographies of the artists involved is at this link.

Follow this tag link to read posts relating to NZDC on this website.

Jennifer Shennan, 3 June 2020

Featured image: Chrissy Kokiri of New Zealand Dance Company, 2018. Photo: © John McDermott

Queensland Ballet dancers Pol Andrés and Thió-Libby-Rose Niederer. Photo: © David Kelly/Designfront

Dance diary. May 2020

Australian Dance Awards

Nominations are now open for the Australian Dance Awards, 2018 and 2019. You may recall that in 2019 the awards for 2018 were cancelled because of funding issues, so the 2020 nominations are in two parts, one for the various categories in 2018, the other for last year’s work.

Ausdance National is collaborating with sponsors and the Ausdance network to manage the double awards ceremony later in the year, but it is not yet clear what format the ceremony will take. This year a nomination fee has been introduced to help cover costs. Ausdance National continues to work without government funding.

Just to remind you of the excitement these awards generate, below is my favourite image from the 2018 ceremony.

Katrina Rank, Services to Dance 2018 — Katrina Rank, Services to Dance Education, Brisbane 2018

Nominate via this link. Nominations close on 22 June.

Tatiana Leskova

As I read of the horrifying march of COVID-19 into Brazil, my thoughts went straight to dancer Tatiana Leskova who came to Australia on the last of the Ballets Russes tours in 1939-1940. Leskova lives in Rio de Janeiro and I contacted her to see if she was safe and managing the situation. Well, aged 97, she is isolating in her home seeing only a few essential people while maintaining the required distance from them. She says she is well. Great news!

Tatiana Leskova celebrates her 97th birthday, December 2019.

Tatiana Leskova has often helped me identify material I have come across in various situations and I have valued so much the contacts I have had with her. Read more at this tag.

Anita Ardell

Way back in 2001 I interviewed Anita Ardell for the National Library of Australia’s oral history program The interview was only very recently put online, complete with a timed summary. The interview is rich in material about Ardell’s own career, at least in its early phases, as well as in Ardell’s observations about Gertrud Bodenwieser, for whom she danced and taught. Unfortunately a second session, which would have taken Ardell’s career into the 1980s and beyond did not eventuate. But what was recorded is well worth a listen.

Anita Ardell as Toinette in Gertrud Bodenwieser's 'The Imaginary Invalid', 1950. Photo: Peter Burden — Anita Ardell as Toinette the Chambermaid in Gertrud Bodenwieser’s *The Imaginary Invalid,* 1950. Photo Peter Burden. National Library of Australia

Using the audio file below, listen to a tiny (1:07 mins) excerpt from the interview. The full interview is available at this link.

Digital seasons

While I have been enjoying watching a range of streamed performances from major companies around the world, and am looking forward to more, I did wonder why American Ballet Theatre was not joining in the streaming arrangements. Earlier in May, however, I read an article by Marina Harss in The New Yorker, which explained why. ABT has no digital archive. In the article ABT’s executive director, Kara Medoff Barnett, is quoted as saying, ‘Our strength is our cohesion and collaborative spirit. Our weakness is not having a library of digital content.’ Later in the article Barnett says, ‘I told my colleagues, the age of the ephemeral is over. From now on we must capture everything that we do, from rehearsals to the stage.’*

The streaming sessions from Australian dance companies show just how lucky we are in Australia. The material we have seen has been professionally filmed and, while there is nothing to compare with a live performance, what we have seen on screen has been a joy to watch.

Kristian Fredrikson. Designer

My forthcoming book Kristian Fredrikson. Designer is now with the printer. It will be launched later this year, although exactly when depends on further easing of restrictions in relation to the coronavirus pandemic. Updates will be forthcoming. The title page, below, shows Ako Kondo and Juliet Burnett as Guardian Swans in Graeme Murphy’s Swan Lake, revival of 2014. Photo by Jeff Busby, courtesy of the Australian Ballet.

Pre-orders can be made at this link.

Michelle Potter, 31 May 2020

*Marina Harss, ‘Dancing on their own during the coronavirus crisis.’ The New Yorker, 21 May 2020 (digital edition).