Bronislava Nijinska

News

Dance diary. December 2022

At the end of December it is always interesting to look back on statistics for the year. During 2022, Jennifer Shennan and I have posted 58 items on the website (just over one per week) and we have received around 46,000 visits over that period. Melbourne tops the list of cities from which our readers have come, but the website attracts visitors from around the world, especially (apart from Australia and New Zealand) from the United States and the United Kingdom. May our statistics continue to improve over the year to come and I wish all our friends and colleagues a happy new year. May 2023 be filled with dance, in whatever form that may currently be for you.


In the meantime, below are some news items that emerged during December 2022.

  • Joseph Romancewicz

In a recent ‘Behind Ballet’ post, the Australian Ballet has explained why I have not seen Joseph Romancewicz onstage for some time. I have admired his dancing, and his strong stage presence, since 2018 when I thoroughly enjoyed his performance in a small role in a production of The Merry Widow, but had been a little disappointed that I hadn’t seen him recently. Well an injury in 2021 has kept him out of performances but it seems, with the help of the Australian Ballet’s health team and some surgery, he has recovered. He was an excellent Tybalt in the recent production of Cranko’s Romeo and Juliet and I look forward to seeing him again in 2023.

Joseph Romancewicz (right) as Tybalt with Jarryd Madden in Romeo and Juliet. The Australian Ballet, 2022. Photo: © Daniel Boud

  • Melanie Lane

Melanie Lane, whose recent work in Canberra was Metal Park for QL2 Dance’s annual Quantum Leap show, has been named Choreographer in Residence 2023-2024 by Melbourne’s Chunky Move. The Choreographer in Residence initiative will invest $120,000 in Lane’s practice over the two years including a direct contribution of $50,000 in artist fees and $70,000 towards the commission of a major work in the second year of the tenure.

Melanie Lane rehearsing Quantum Leap dancers for Metal Park, 2022. Photo: © Lorna Sim

Lane has previously been commissioned by Sydney Dance Company, where she showed her unforgettable work WOOF, and by Australasian Dance Collective, Dance North, Chunky Move, Schauspiel Leipzig and West Australian Ballet. She was the recipient of the 2018 Keir choreographic award and the 2017 Leipziger Bewegungskunstpreis in Germany.

I interviewed Lane earlier this year while she was preparing Metal Park. See this link for what I wrote as a result of the interview. I am very much looking forward too to seeing what eventuates from Lane’s work with Chunky Move.

  • La Nijinska. A new book by Lynn Garafola

How little I knew about Bronislava Nijinska before reading Lynn Garafola’s latest, intensively researched book La Nijinska. It is a very dense book but, from the countless research elements, stories and anecdotes, one or two stand out for me, largely for personal reasons. I was interested to read about the genesis of Les Noces for example: it has a whole chapter to itself. It reminded me of a performance in Canberra way back in 1982 when Don Asker, then directing the city’s resident dance company, Human Veins Dance Theatre, choreographed a version of Les Noces for a Stravinsky Festival. Asker collaborated with the Canberra School of Music and, perhaps ‘for the first time ever’, so the media reported, had the music performed as Stravinsky envisaged it. The orchestra, including four grand pianos, soloists and chorus, shared the stage with the dancers. It was a monumental undertaking and one not to be forgotten.

Perhaps the most interesting snippet for me, however, was a brief discussion of Nijinska as a potential director of a second Ballets Russes company for Colonel de Basil, one that would eventually head to Australia. The story goes:

Now, in the summer of 1936, rumours circulated about the likelihood of de Basil forming a second company that would tour Australia, while the main company danced in Germany and the United States. Thomas Armour … wrote to a friend on April 22, “I have been told de Basil really plans this year to have two companies and that Nijinska will be in charge of the second.” (Lynn Garafola, La Nijinska. New York, Oxford University Press, 2022, p. 359).

Well it didn’t happen that Nijinska came to Australia in that role. It was Leon Woizikowsky who headed that 1936 visit to Australia. One must wonder however how different ballet in Australia might have been had it happened!

  • The Dying Swan

As we begin a new year, enjoy a beautiful performance of The Dying Swan danced by Nina Ananiashvili. It comes from the Jacob’s Pillow playlist, an amazing source of dance on film from works performed over the years at Jacob’s Pillow in Becket, Massachusetts. Watch Ananiashvili here.

Michelle Potter, 31 December 2022

Featured image: A private lesson. Photo: © Tim Potter

News

Dance diary. January 2022

  • West Australian Ballet

What a pleasure it is to be able to say that West Australian Ballet is turning 70 in 2022. It is the oldest ballet company in Australia and was founded in 1952 by the former Ballet Russes dancer Kira Abricossova Bousloff. The company gave its first performance in 1953 and turned professional when Rex Reid was appointed artistic director in 1969. Since then its directors have included Robyn Haig, Garth Welch, Barry Moreland, Ted Brandsen and Ivan Cavallari. It is currently directed by Aurélian Scanella who has now been at the helm of the company for ten years.

Unfortunately, Western Australia has very strict entry requirements at the moment and it is not an easy place to visit for those who live outside the State. The thought of missing certain parts of the 2022 program is hard to take. I am especially interested that the company is planning its own new production of Swan Lake in late 2022. It will be choreographed by Krzysztof Pastor, will have a distinct relationship to West Australian culture and society, and will incorporate Indigenous material into the production. While this Swan Lake promises to be unique, the focus on the culture of the West is also an exceptional way to honour Kira Bousloff whose early repertoire incorporated reflections on Australian life and culture.

  • La Nijnska. A new book by Lynn Garafola

Esteemed dance historian Lynn Garafola has recently completed a biography of Bronislava Nijinska. As the first in-depth account of the life and career of a dance artist about whom so little has been written, La Nijinska is a publication which we can anticipate with particular interest. The book is being published shortly by Oxford University Press, although its exact publication date seems to vary somewhat according to different sources. Details are on the OUP website.

And on an Australian note, Kira Bousloff, founder of West Australian Ballet as mentioned above, took classes with Nijinska and performed with her company. She talks about her experiences in an oral history conducted with her in 1990 for the National Library of Australia’s oral history program. The interview is online at this link.

  • BOLD Festival 2022

The much delayed BOLD Festival (originally planned for 2021) is going ahead in Canberra and online in March. See below for information from the BOLD team on the keynote addresses and the BOLD Lecture. Further information as it comes to hand.

We are thrilled to announce our three Keynote speakers and the 2022 BOLD Lecture. Talks will be in person and live-streamed on the 3rd and 4th March at the National Library of Australia. They will then be available online for 22 days.

Our opening Keynote is Eileen Kramer who, at 107 years of age, continues to create dances, stories, costumes and films, even in the midst of Covid lockdowns. Her tenacity and creativity shine through this difficult time.

In conversation with long time collaborator Sue Healey, Eileen will reveal ideas about longevity of practice and what drives her to keep creating.




Our next Keynote is the extraordinary Gary Lang speaking from the heat of Darwin about his life as a Larrakia artist.I will speak of the unique way I, as an Artistic Director and choreographer, use multi cultural dancers to tell my people’s first nations stories on the local, National and International stage through my work with the NT Dance Company. Our work reflects the rich multicultural tapestry of the Territory and collaborates with leading dance companies including most recently, NAISDA Dance College, West Australian Ballet, Northumbria University UK and MIKU Performing Arts from East Arnhem Land.
ID; An indigenous man with silver hair, wearing glasses, white shirt, black trousers and turquoise wrap, sitting barefoot on a chair in a darkened theatre. Theatre lights glow dimly behind him and his left arm and leg are elegantly crossed as he looks directly at the camera. 

Our closing Keynote is Dr Michelle Potter who will discuss ‘The Revenger’s Tragedy’. Revenge tragedies always have a tragic outcome, but Melbourne Theatre Company’s 1975 production of the Jacobean play ‘The Revenger’s Tragedy’ had a surprising and very positive outcome for the future of dance in Australia.

The talk references Dr Potter’s stunning book Kristian Fredrikson; Designer as the designer of the production and acts as a soft launch for the National Library of Australia’s On Stage exhibition opening that day, running until the 7th August 2022.


Kristian Fredrikson, costume design for The Duke in The Revenger’s Tragedy, 1975. National Library of Australia
ID; a water paint of a male character throwing his hands in the air wearing a black and white bold patterned cape with brown and dark blue lining, black and white patterned trousers, black boots, intricate chest piece detailed with brown and a high ruffled neck, Elizabethan style.

Our conference closes with the BOLD Lecture given in the memory and spirit of Scotland based Australian dance artist Janice Claxton. Janis worked internationally, she was a hugely talented choreographer, a tour-de-force and front-line fighter for equality in dance. The first BOLD Lecture was given by Claire Hicks, Director of Critical Path. This year we will be joined by Marc Brew, another Scotland based Australian choreographer working internationally. Most recently he was the Artistic Director of AXIS Dance Company, USA.

ID; A photo of a white male, slim build, 6′ 2″ tall, wheelchair user with a shaved head, green eyes and sculpted facial stubble, wearing a black at cap, black jumper and a black & grey scarf around his neck. Poised in front of a grey background. Photo credit; Maurice RamirezMarc is a Disabled choreographer, director and dancer. His lecture titled ‘Point of the Spear’ will share his personal experience of the importance of being an advocate for accessibility and inclusion. How, collectively, we all need to work together to be Inclusive in our thinking and actions to make the world equitable for all.

On a final note applications for The Annie are coming in which is brilliant. Do keep sharing the word so we can support an artist to create work on older dancers with Annie’s inimitable spirit chivvying us on.



Next up we will announce our workshop series which will be offered over the 5 days of the Festival. We have 15 workshops being offered in person in Canberra and on Zoom from around Australia, LA, Canada, Singapore and the US. Be fabulous
Stay Bold
best wishes

The BOLD Team
 
  • New appointments

A range of departures and new appointments to dance and dance-related organisations was announced over the past month or two. In Australia they include the departure after close to twelve years of Anne Dunn from Sydney Dance Company to take on the role of Executive Director and Co-Chief Executive Officer of Sydney Theatre Company. Lou Oppenheim will take on the role of CEO of Sydney Dance Company in mid-February.

Elsewhere in the world they include the appointment of Tamara Rojo as Artistic Director of San Francisco Ballet. Rojo leaves English National Ballet in late 2022 to become the first female director of SFB. She replaces Helgi Tomasson.

Michelle Potter, 31 January 2022

Featured image: Dayana Hardy Acuna in a publicity shot for West Australian Ballet’s 2022 Swan Lake. Photo: © Finlay Mackay and Wunderman Thompson