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REVIEWS | By Sara Veale

Dispatch from London: 2017 in Review

Sturm und Drang—2017 saw the dance world roiling with it, both on and off the stage. Israel’s culture minister hit the headlines for refusing arts funding to performances involving nudity; Palestinian-Syrian refugee Ahmad Joudeh made a prominent debut with the Dutch National Ballet after fleeing death threats from Islamic State; discord boiled over in Moscow as Kirill Serebrennikov, the director of the Bolshoi’s long-awaited “Nureyev” was placed under house arrest on what many suspect are trumped-up charges intended to punish him for celebrating the life of a gay man on stage—a conspicuous challenge to Putin’s ban on so-called ‘homosexual propaganda.’...

REVIEWS | By Victoria Looseleaf

Reason to Rejoice

If ever there were a time when art was needed, this is it. The year that began—and continues to this day—with a Twitter-happy and some would say, deranged lunatic sitting in the Oval Office could only, at every twist and turn, benefit from the grace, beauty and power of art. That the #MeToo movement has also encompassed wide swaths of politics, Hollywood, journalism and yes—even the dance world—is both emboldening and sad.

REVIEWS | By Rebecca Ritzel

A Final Serenade

There could be no more auspicious moment for Suzanne Farrell to mark the closure of her ballet company than December 2017. With the New York City Ballet future of her former partner Peter Martins very much in doubt, Farrell sent her dancers out onstage at the Kennedy Center last week to perform works she and Martins had often danced together, works created by the man who cast her out of his company after she rebuffed his proposal.

REVIEWS | By Rachel Elderkin

Mankind

There’s something that performer Robert Clark is struggling to articulate. As he muddles through his opening speech in Charlotte Vincent's first all-male work for Vincent Dance Theatre, “Shut Down,” the enormity of the topic he is trying to comprehend becomes apparent. There’s a problem with the image of masculinity—that of the strong, unemotional, alpha male.

REVIEWS | By Merilyn Jackson

For Now I am Winter

For the second work of its 2017 fall season, BalletX returned to the newly spruced up Wilma Theater with a reprise of a 2013 commission to internationally in demand choreographer, Nicolo Fonte’s “Beautiful Decay.” Two sets of well-known Philadelphia-based guest dancers alternate during the run. On seeing it the first time with Manfred Fischbeck and Brigitta Herrmann, years ago, and this time with Hellmut Fricke-Gottschild and Brenda Dixon Gottschild in the alternate cast, I find the title even more wincingly uncomfortable.

FEATURES | By Shelby Elsbree

Just Breathe

Just over a year ago, I made an early decision to retire from my career as a professional dancer. Leaving behind the glory of the stage, the grind of endless hours in the studio . . . the past 16 years of my life dedicated to performing art. I know for certain that not one day has gone by that I haven’t considered my decision, contemplated my timing . . . wondered what ballet I might be rehearsing or injury I might be nursing if I was still “in the game.” I go to the theater frequently to get my...

REVIEWS | By Victoria Looseleaf

Atlas Shrugged

No matter how many bells, whistles and special effects are deployed in a dance, if the choreography isn’t there, the exercise/event borders on being pointless. To wit: the two-act “Tesseract,” a collaboration between filmmaker Charles Atlas and choreographers Rashaun Mitchell and Silas Riener, who happen to be very good movers. That this trio also comes with a first-class pedigree—Atlas served as filmmaker-in-residence for Merce Cunningham for a decade from the early 1970s through 1983, and Mitchell and Riener both danced with the postmodern genius during the troupe’s final years—upped the expectation ante while falling short on its deliverables.

REVIEWS | By Claudia Lawson

Misty!

In 2015 David McAllister, the Australian Ballet’s long time artistic director debuted his first full- length work at the Sydney Opera House: his lavish, and wildly successful, “The Sleeping Beauty.” At the time, the Australian Ballet keenly revealed that more than 70 per cent of the production costs (thought to be in the millions) were raised through 2000-plus philanthropic donations. The financial support was not only obvious, but allowed McAllister’s artistic vision to be fully realized; the stage dripped with beautifully ornate sets, luxurious costumes and intricate detailing—it was a financial and creative success.

DANCE FILM | By Rachel Stone

Polina, danser sa vie

In the Hans Christian Andersen fairytale The Red Shoes, a young girl is given an auspicious gift: a pair of slippers, stitched with a curse. Once she slips on the red shoes, she can’t stop dancing. The shoes carry her out into the dark forest, and into an open grave. In the fairytale, she is doomed to dance until a kind executioner cuts off her feet. In Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s 1948 film by the same name, the young dancer (Moira Shearer) throws herself from an open window.

REVIEWS | By Rachel Elderkin

Light & Dark Matters

This year marks the 25th anniversary of Sir Kenneth MacMillan’s death. To celebrate the life and work of the internationally renowned choreographer and former Royal Ballet director, the UK’s leading ballet companies joined together to perform a season of MacMillan’s work.

REVIEWS | By Lorna Irvine

Balancing Delicacy and Deadlines

Details and the slightest intricacies are key to this showcase of BalletBoyz’ incredible work, displaying their versatility. A hand placed just so, a smile that is hard to read, bodies entwined, in conflict and pushed apart. With an audacious, challenging remit of creating brand new works for the company in just a fortnight, four choreographers bring pieces of delicacy and precision in collaboration with four composers. Balance and power structures is the theme threading through the evening, topped off by a critically acclaimed half hour long piece from 2013 by Russell Maliphant, called “Fallen” (the most balletic in the purest...

REVIEWS | By Gracia Haby

Submerged

“Our past, our present, and whatever remains of our future, absolutely depend on what we do now. ” — Sylvia Earle, Oceanographer

Featured Reads

REVIEWS | Lorna Irvine

Teenage Angst and Institutions

Watching Matthew Bourne's reworked version of the “star-cross'd lovers,” I was briefly reminded of Veronica, played by Winona Ryder, in the dark 1988 comedy by Daniel Waters and Michael Lehmann, Heathers, and her line, “my teen angst bullshit has a body count.” Yes, this is the darker side of Bourne's repertoire,...

INTERVIEWS | Marina Harss

The Me of Today

The choreographer Alexei Ratmansky reflects on the war in Ukraine, the connection between geopolitics and ballet, and joining the house of Balanchine.

REVIEWS | Rachel Howard

Starry Nights

Beneath blue California skies, manicured trees, and the occasional hum of an overhead airplane, Tamara Rojo took the Frost Amphitheater stage at Stanford University to introduce herself as the new artistic director of San Francisco Ballet.

REVIEWS | Faye Arthurs

America, F**K Yeah

After a week of the well-balanced meal that is “Jewels”—the nutritive, potentially tedious, leafy greens of “Emeralds,” the gamy, carnivorous “Rubies,” and the decadent, shiny white mountains of meringue in “Diamonds”—the New York City Ballet continued its 75th Anniversary All-Balanchine Fall Season with rather more dyspeptic fare.

REVIEWS | Emily May

Acosta Danza’s Choreographic Soup

An “Ajiaco” is a type of soup common to Colombia, Cuba, and Peru that combines a variety of different vegetables, spices, and meats.