Heartfelt Moments

The Australian Ballet’s “Signature Works,” as a whole, is a compact and varied celebration of dance in the moment. Just as dancers are attuned to each moment, the “Signature Works” line up asks the audience to be present. Listening, as dancers do to their bodies, the audience is asked to read the dance, feel what it evokes within them, and carry forth this attention and questioning: what is being seen, what are they doing, what are we celebrating? Prowess, artistry, and a “sense of these beautiful dancers performing exactly as they are now,” such things spring from a supportive foundation, where ‘where have we come from?’ answers ‘where are we going?’

Performance

The Australian Ballet: “Signature Works”

Place

The Regent Theatre, Melbourne, Australia, March 1, 2026

Words

Gracia Haby

Amy Ronnfeldt and Jeremy Hargreaves in “This Moment” by Yuiko Masukawa. Photograph by Kate Longley

And as such Jeremy Hargreaves and Amy Ronnfeldt hover before me like two dimorphic insects, in “The Moment” by Yuiko Masukawa. In costumes designed by Ailsa Woodyard, a transparent skirt of Ronnfeldt reads like wings, fluttering, as Hargreaves raises her lightly overhead. Just as a pas de deux requires one dancer to be in tune with another, moving in relation, connected, if not always physically, but emotionally, Masukawa seems to be inviting the audience to do the same. “To be in a moment with the dancers,”[1] sharing what they are feeling. Set to Caroline Shaw’s Plan & Elevation, Masukawa picks up this thread and weaves it further, bringing the warmth and individuality of each dancer forward. Meshing classical with contemporary, past with present, the flickering lines within both the music and unfurling upon stage read heartfelt.

All that is heartfelt embodies the feel of the opening of the Australian Ballet’s 2026 season at the Regent Theatre, for its third and final year before returning to the Arts Centre, and the Ian Potter State Theatre’s stage (formerly State Theatre) in October. Presented over three performances on a single weekend, “Signature Works” opens with the hypnotic Kingdom of the Shades from “La Bayadère,” with choreography after Marius Petipa; followed by leaps of vigour in the “Flames of Paris” pas de deux, with choreography after Vasili Vainonen, energetically fanned by soloists Samara Merrick and Marko Juusela; detours by way of Marco Goecke’s “Morpheus’ Dream;” before settling into George Balanchine’s “Ballet Imperial,” the first Balanchine work staged by the company in 1967. These giddy dips form an cumulative experience of joy, as the “Grand Pas Classique” pas de deux, with choreography after Victor Gsovsky, staged by David McAllister, is sewn alongside Walter Bourke’s tambourine-resplendent “Grande Tarantella” to make a sparkling gala night, in feel if not in name.

“Grande Tarantella” by Walter Bourke. Photograph by Kate Longley

The scaffolding of a book and dance are not so dissimilar. From the supportive framework, the space around the reader or the audience is an open meadow. The journey, though carefully plotted, took me on unexpected turns, and it was especially wonderful to see principal artists Sharni Spencer and Joseph Caley return to the stage, from maternity leave and injury, respectively. To meet new faces to the company as well, with Precious Adams, from English National Ballet, twinkling alongside fellow senior artists Rina Nemoto and Yuumi Yamada (Trio of Shades, “La Bayadère”), and later soloist Katherine Sonnekus and coryphée Larissa Kiyoto-Ward (“Ballet Imperial”).

In 1985, Elizabeth Toohey and former artistic director David McAllister won bronze medal at the Fifth International Ballet Competition in Moscow, dancing Walter Bourke’s “Grande Tarantella.” A signature work of the company for many years, soloist Aya Watanabe and senior artist Cameron Holmes, leap as if skittering atop the very ivories of Louis Moreau Gottschalk’s piano, such is the work’s toe-tapping brightness, where the music takes shape before my eyes. Of which Spencer, partnered by senior artist Davi Ramos, together chime as they pay homage to Petipa and Gsovsky in the smile-inducing “Grand Pas Classique.” Principal Robyn Hendricks’s transformative presence upon the stage, as both temple dancer, Nikiya, at the tale’s opening, and “Ballet Imperial” at the close, ever evokes a sense of though the (outside) world might have slipped her moorings, all is not lost.

Of brightness and elegance, in the moment, exquisitely.

Gracia Haby

Using an armoury of play and poetry as a lure, Gracia Haby is an artist besotted with paper. Her limited edition artists’ books, and other works hard to pin down, are often made collaboratively with fellow artist, Louise Jennison. Their work is in the collections of the National Gallery of Australia and state libraries throughout Australia to the Tate (UK). Gracia Haby is known to collage with words as well as paper.

footnotes

“Being part of this program, alongside choreographers whose work I have admired for so many years, makes the experience even more meaningful. Because this opportunity holds such significance for me, I felt a strong desire … to be fully present in every moment of the process.” Yuiko Masukawa quoted by Heather Bloom, ‘Every Second Counts’, February 20, 2026, The Australian Ballet blog, https://australianballet.com.au/blog/every-second-counts, March 2, 2026.

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