Oberon's Grove

In Motion X

Soojin Choi of Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet.

Shen Wei @ Lincoln Center Festival

Shen Wei Dance Arts will present the three-part cycle RE-I, II, III at Alice Tully Hall this Thursday thru Saturday, July 9-11th.  Above: Lois Greenfield photo.

Each of the three evenings has a subtitle: Tibet (Thursday), Angkor Wat (Friday) and The New Silk Road (Saturday). Further information about the performances here. (Note: the first night appears to be sold out!)

Read about the choreographer whose work for the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics was admired throughout the world here.  Above portrait of Shen Wei by Ernestine Ruben. The Shen Wei Dance Arts blog is brimming over with news, photos and videos about the Company and about this much-anticipated event.

NYIBC: Solos + AUREOLE

Whitney Browne's photos from the New York International Ballet Competition included four solos that Kokyat and I especially enjoyed, plus another look at the pas de deux from AUREOLE which we had watch Rachel Berman coaching during the days running up to the Competition. Above, Cara Cooper dancing Amour de la Vie.

Hayeryn Kim's solo entry, Virgin Heart.

Bronze medalist and Arpino Award winner Ricardo Santos performing Premiera Voz.

Kokyat was especially enamoured of Hayley Blackburn's fleet-footed interpretation of the Sugar Plum Fairy's solo from NUTCRACKER.

Caroline Betancourt and Ben Needham-Wood danced the duet from Paul Taylor's AUREOLE. 

Home Sweet Home

At the final Saturday matinee of New York City Ballet's Spring season, I brought Kokyat to watch his first performance by the Company. Much as he enjoyed the ballet, he was possibly even more taken with being in the theatre which Philip Johnson built for Mr. B. As an interior designer with a great interest in architecture, Kokyat described to me several of the details and building materials used in the Koch Theatre's lobby and Promenade spaces which I have always simply taken for granted.

Most of these photos will expand if you click on them.

During the intermission, Kokyat went off on his own to take a few pictures of Mr. B's House.

Now that the season has ended I'm really missing spending two or three nights a week at my home-away-from-home. I've always loved this theatre, ever since I first set foot in it on an historic night in 1966 when Beverly Sills became an overnight star (at age 40!)

Promenade. I'm in this picture.

Yasuhide Kobashi's sculpture Ancient Dance.  Kobashi was born in Kojima, Japan in 1931. He learned printmaking from the great master Unichi Hiratsuka. In 1955 he graduated from the Kyoto College of Crafts and Textiles. Yasuhide Kobashi works as a sculptor and printmaker - a combination not to be met very often. Since 1965 the artist has lived permanently in the USA.

Kobashi's companion piece, Ancient Song: Kokyat in a hallucinatory mood.

Elie Nadelman's enormous Circus Women.

Enemy At The Gates

We recently watched this 2001 film and were drawn in to the true story of rival sharpshooters stalking one another in the ruins of Stalingrad as the cataclysmic battle which basically spelled the defeat of the Nazi empire raged for months in the decimated Russian city.

Jude Law is Vassili Zaitsev, a young soldier who had grown up in the Urals tending his family's flock of sheep. He developed keen skills as a sharpshooter by killing the wolves who endangered his lambs and once in the army his accomplishments lead him to be posted as a sniper. His success is astonishing; he picks off Nazi officers with pinpoint precision. The military newspaper begins to record his daily tally of victims and he becomes a folk hero, inspiring his comrades as the battle of Stalingrad rages on and on. 

Ed Harris plays his nemesis, the German sharpshooter Major Konig. The Germans send this man, who reportedly was not a Nazi but an aristocrat of the old school, to deal with Vassili Zaitsev once and for all. Their cat-and-mouse game leads them all over the ruins of the city. Who gets the last shot? Watch the film and find out.

Joseph Feinnes plays the political attache and publisher of the military newspaper, Danilov. It is his idea to make Zaitsev a focal point for the discouraged Russian troops; he turns the marksman into a legend.

Rachel Weisz is Tania, a young soldier love by both Zaitsev and Danilov. In a furtive sexual encounter, Tania and Vassili make love among the slumbering soldiers. Without nudity or any blatant sexual images, the scene is incredibly erotic.

Bob Hoskins makes quite a remarkable Nikita Kruschev. Kruschev was the Russian premier during the years of my youth and the moment Hoskins appeared in the film I knew exactly who he was portraying even though I hadn't read a synopsis of the film. The resemblance is uncanny.

One of the most poignant characters in the film is a young boot-black named Sacha. Played by Gabriel Marshall-Thomson with innocent eagerness, Sacha functions as a mole for the Russians, obtaining information as he shines Konig's boots each day. Sacha sets up the encounters of the two snipers by revealing what sector of the city Zaitsev will be in each day. Konig likes the boy and values the input but quickly figures out that he's being manipulated. Sacha pays with his life.

There are horrific images of soldiers going to their deaths in the film. The Russian commanders would order troops into an assault and observe from behind; any Russian soldier retreating even one step would be shot by his own superiors. In this hopeless situation, an estimated million Soviet troops died in the prolonged battle. The entire German 6th Army (300,000 men) were virtually wiped out. The total of civilian casualties has never been verified, but it is telling that in a 1940 census, Stalingrad's population was 850,000. In 1945 the census tally was...1,500. Total Russian casualties, military and civilian, during the course of World War II are estimated at over 20,000,000. That doesn't include the wounded. 

More than anything, the film reminds us of the horrors which ideologies based on racism or religious fanaticism have unleashed on humanity over the centuries. I am wondering if the captured German soldier above is thinking if it was all worthwhile, fighting for the Fuhrer.

Above, the victory monument: The Motherland Calls. 

SYLVIA @ ABT

Wednesday July 1, 2009 - SYLVIA is a pleasing affair only because of the Leo Delibes score. As a story ballet, it's totally contrived and dramatically thin. Tonight at ABT, despite excellent dancing, I found myself unable to connect to it. Above: the legendary ballerina Olga Preobrajenskaya costumed for the title-role.

Michele Wiles and Roberto Bolle both looked marvelous and danced marvelously, but so much of the first act is mere filler for fauns and nymphs dancing not-very-interesting choreography. I admit to leaving during the intermission.

Carla Korbes

Wei and I have really missed Carla since she left NYC Ballet.

Above: Carla in Pacific Northwest Ballet's SWAN LAKE/photo by Angela Sterling.

Catch PNB at The Pillow this summer!

NYIBC - Photo Gallery

Silver medalists Amber Neumann and John Mark Giragosian. This and all photos in this entry are by Whitney Browne, courtesy NYIBC.

Amber Neumann & John Mark Giragosian, representing the USA.

John Mark Giragosian.

Ki Wan Kim partnering Young Jung Rhee (both from Korea). He won a Lefkowitz Award for Jury Recognition and she was a Bronze medalist.

Bronze medalists Artjom Maksakov (Estonia) with his Russian partner Olga Malinovskaya.

Bronze medalist and Arpino Award winner, Brazil's Ricardo Santos

Italy's Marco Pagetti, Lefkowitz Award for Jury Recognition.

Jia Zhang (China) was presented with a Lefkowitz Award for Artistic Recognition. Her partner is Young Jae Jung (Korea).

Click on the images to enlarge (in most cases!)

4th of July Abroad

Some of our favorite dancers are spending the 4th of July dancing Ratmansky and Wheeldon at the Teatro Romano, Spoleto.

Photos by Kokyat

Kokyat is a big Noguchi fan.

We liked this poster.

Cara Cooper in a coaching session at the New York International Ballet Competition. Cara made a striking impression dancing her solo Amour de la Vie in a gorgeous red gown at the concluding Gala.

Lift!

You!

Click on the photos for enhanced viewing.