Ballets Russes
Founded by the Russian impressario Sergei Diaghilev in 1909, the Ballets Russes played a role of fundamental importance in the development of early twentieth-century modernism.…
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Parade
A one-act ballet on the theme of a fairground sideshow, Parade was produced by Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes, and premiered on May 18, 1917 at…
Ballets Suédois (1920–25)
Rolf de Maré’s Ballets Suédois was active from 1920 to 1925. It was the chief artistic rival to Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes, and de Maré was…
Dance
Historically, modern dance scholarship has followed the contours of the field as defined by John Martin, the revered dance critic for The New York Times,…
Nijinsky, Vaslav (1889–1950)
Vaslav Nijinsky was a Russian dancer and choreographer of Polish descent. He achieved international renown as the star of Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes Company between…
Apollon Musagète
Apollon Musagète, premiered by Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes in 1928, and most widely known since the 1950s as Apollo, is the oldest work by choreographer…
Fokine, Michel (1880–1942)
Michel Fokine’s seventeen works for Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes (1909–29) revitalized ballet in the early twentieth century. In Fokine’s most successful works, the body became…
de Mille, Agnes (1905–1993)
Agnes de Mille performed as a self-producing female dance soloist; she choreographed for Ballets Russes and Ballet Theatre (now the AmericanBallet Theatre) and transformed the…
Diaghilev, Serge (1872–1929)
Impresario, critic, curator, and founder-director of the Ballets Russes (1909–1929), Serge Diaghilev was a towering figure and pioneer of early 20th-century modernism. Through his various…
Surrealism Overview
Soupault’s publication of Manifeste du Surréalism in 1924. Rising in the wake of the First World War, Surrealism revolted against a world that had become…
Futurism
Futurism emerged at the beginning of the twentieth century as a movement that explicitly conceptualized the process of literary and artistic experimentation as part of…
Massine, Léonide (1896–1979)
Russian-born Léonide Massine’s career flourished in the cities of Western Europe, where he made his name as a lead dancer and choreographer for Serge Diaghilev’s…
Nijinska, Bronislava (1891–1972)
The premiere female ballet choreographer of the first half of the twentieth century, Bronislava Nijinska experienced the transformative power of the Russian Revolution and discovered…
Karsavina, Tamara (1885–1978)
Trained at St. Petersburg’s Imperial Ballet School, Tamara Karsavina became, in the course of her long and varied career, the prototypical modern ballerina. A dancer…
Balanchine, George (1904–1983)
George Balanchine (Georgii Melitonovich Balanchivadze), arguably the greatest ballet choreographer of the twentieth century, was at once both modernist and traditionalist. Unlike many radical innovators,…
Hoffman, Gertrude (1886–1966)
Gertrude Hoffman (Hoffmann) was an early twentieth-century Broadway dance director and performer, and the first woman to receive a dance direction—or choreographic—credit on Broadway. From…
Natalia Sergeevna Goncharova (1881–1962)
One of the most talented and prolific of 20th-century Russian artists, Natalia Goncharova was not only a leading member of the Russian avant-garde in the…
World of Art (МИР ИССКУСТВА)
Born in St. Petersburg on the threshold of the 20th century, the World of Art group of artists, writers, and musicians was a primary representative…
Escudero, Vicente (1892–1980)
Vicente Escudero was a multitalented artist. There is no question that the great bailaor Antonio el de Bilbao, whom he met on a tour of…
Börlin, Jean (1893–1930)
As principal choreographer and dancer for the 1920s avant-garde troupe Les Ballets Suédois (Swedish Ballet), Jean Börlin contributed greatly to the modernist cauldron that was…
Satie, Erik Alfred Leslie (1866–1925)
Erik Satie’s compositions, writings, and humor played an important role in many modernist movements of the twentieth century. Experimenting with simple forms, neoclassicism, mysticism, satire,…
Mercé y Luque, Antonia Rosa (Stage Name: La Argentina; b. 4 September 1888, Buenos Aires, Argentina; d. 18 July 1936, Bayonne, France)
Antonia Rosa Mercé y Luque, known by her stage name La Argentina, was the most celebrated Spanish dancer of the early 20th century. Greatly influenced…
De Maré, Rolf (1888–1964)
Rolf de Maré was a Swedish-born impresario, art collector, and philanthropist. Born into one of Sweden’s wealthiest families, he began collecting modern art at an…
Levinson, André (Andrei Iakovlevich Levinson) (1887–1933)
A critic and theorist, André Levinson continued the nineteenth-century continental tradition of dance and ballet criticism as part of philosophical and aesthetic inquiry: dance as…
Ashton, Frederick William Mallandaine (1904–1988)
Frederick Ashton was a British choreographer and dancer whose work significantly contributed to the development and identity of The Royal Ballet. Along with its founder,…