Dance diary. July 2021
…rs of watching dance (and even performing it), I walked out of a show. I found Joel Bray’s I liked it but …. unwatchable. I left because I really couldn’t accept the way that various dance styles were described. Perhaps it changed later after I had left, I don’t know, but basically I am opposed to dance, in whatever format, being put down, often in a way that seems ignorant of the true nature of that format. Michelle Potter, 31 July 2021 Featured…
Athol Willoughby. Lifetime Achievement Award 2018
…lloughby. The citation above is a slightly expanded version of that issued under my name by the Australian Dance Awards committee. Quoted from an oral history interview recorded in 2013 for the National Library of Australia’s Oral History and Folklore Program. TRC 6514 Michelle Potter, 14 August 2018 Featured image: Athol Willoughby with Noelle Aitken and Naeidra Torrens in Swan Lake, National Theatre Ballet, 1950s. Personal collection of Athol Wi…
Dance diary. February 2023 (Russell Kerr Lecture)
…beginning in 1959 with New Zealand Ballet, then under the direction of the company’s founder, Poul Gnatt, and continuing across the world while being interspersed with return visits to New Zealand to perform again with the national company. Patricia Rianne as the Dowager Duchess, with Carl Myers and others, in Swan Lake. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 1985. Photographer not identified This fifth Russell Kerr lecture was somewhat different from previous…
The Australian Ballet in 2023
…e Hum from Daniel Riley and Paragon from Alice Topp. Topp is currently resident choreographer with the company while Riley is artistic director of the Adelaide-based Australian Dance Theatre. The pairing of works from Riley and Topp promises to bring a certain diversity with the two choreographers coming from quite different dance and ethnic backgrounds. Paragon aims to pay tribute to the heritage of the Australian Ballet while The Hum will be a c…
Leanne Benjamin. New artistic director of Queensland Ballet
…iety of dance-related activities. Everything suggests that she will make a committed director and will constantly interact with a range of dance communities in a variety of ways. I guess my major interest at present, however, is in the kind of repertoire Benjamin will bring to Queensland Ballet. The 2024 season has already been announced and has been curated by Li Cunxin so we won’t really have an idea of how Benjamin will approach repertoire unti…
Dance diary. December 2023
…two vastly different approaches to dance. Two of Lake’s recent works (for companies other than her own Stephanie Lake Company), are reviewed on this website at these links: Auto Cannibal (2019) and Biography (2022) Promotions at the Australian Ballet There were a number of promotions announced as the Australian Ballet’s 2023 season came to an end. Seen below in a scene from Don Quixote are newly appointed principals Jill Ogai and Marcus Morelli….
Paganini. An exhibition and reconstruction
…s these two photographs of scenes from Paganini as performed by de Basil’s company in South America. Both come from the album of photographs assembled by James Upshaw. The first one is on a page headed ‘Cordoba’ so is most likely from 1942. The other is on a unmarked page and cannot at this stage be dated with any certainty. UPDATE: 24 July 2013: Both photos were taken in Argentina in 1942 at the Teatro Politeama in Buenos Aires. They both show Ta…
Graduation Ball. Some Australian notes
…ogue as: 385 Le Directeur 386 Convent Pupil 387 Pupil 388 Senior Pupil in Sunday Dress 389 Senior Pupil in Sunday Dress 390 Senior Pupil in Sunday Dress 391 The General 392 Cadet 393 Cadet 394 La Sylphide 395 Scotchman 396 The Bearded Drummer 397 The Professor 398 The Governess 399 The Professor 400 The Lover 401 The Lover 402 The Major Domo 403 The Maid 404 Marquette [sic] and Plans of Scene Not all the characters for which Benois had made design…
Dance diary. September 2019
…is Frederick Ashton’s A Month in the Country, which dates back to 1976. Seeing it just a few years ago I wrote, ‘I found myself swept along by a strong performance from Zenaida Yanowsky as Natalia Petrovna and by Ashton’s ability to define characters through movement. The young, the old, different levels of society, everything was there in the choreography’. The Australian Ballet’s 2020 season includes A Month in the Country as part of a triple b…
Elaine Vallance (1932–2021)
…ured as one of the Spirits of the Whirlwinds, along with others from the Bodenwieser company, in Beth Dean’s Corroboree, staged in celebration of the visit to Australia by Queen Elizabeth II. Elaine Vallance (centre front) with, (clockwise from top left), Nina Baron, Moira Claux and Biruta Apens in a study for Gertrud Bodenwieser’s The Blue Danube, Victorian tour 1950. Photographer unknown. Photo courtesy of Barbara Cuckson During her time with th…