“Moving for a Cultural Dialogue - Wall Street Journal” plus 2 more |
- Moving for a Cultural Dialogue - Wall Street Journal
- A Cuban-American Cultural Exchange Comes Full Circle - New York Times
- Warren County Cultural & Heritage Commission announces winners of Skylands Scenic Beauty ... - NJ.com
| Moving for a Cultural Dialogue - Wall Street Journal Posted: 07 Nov 2010 07:06 PM PST HAVANA— The pictures don't lie: The cars and architecture in Havana are utterly fascinating. Every other vehicle is of a different era—from a 1950s Pontiac Silver Streak to a 1970s Lada. Every other building can make an architecture buff swoon: from the neo-baroque façade of the Gran Teatro to the porticos of the colonial homes. Of course, the Cubans have adapted these relics and made them their own. The same can be said of ballet. The 22nd International Festival of Havana, which concluded Sunday, is hosted by the National Ballet of Cuba, and watching American Ballet Theater dance in this country—the first time it has done so in 50 years—has cast quite a few things in relief. In the U.S., we fret that ballet must be made fresh and relevant. With considerable hand wringing, we want to know: Who is next Balanchine? When will dance recapture the cultural dominance in enjoyed it the 1970s and 1980s? Companies and choreographers are constantly trying new things, and audiences have become accustomed to attending premieres. American Ballet Theatre in CubaA visit to Havana by New York City's American Ballet Theatre is part of a festival celebrating Alicia Alonso, the Cuban ballerina and founder of the National Ballet of Cuba. But as is the custom here, the Cubans are working with what they have: the classical repertory. In shabby studios, the great works of the past are preserved and endlessly polished by generations of dancers to the obvious delight of audiences. When students at the School of the National Ballet gave a presentation on Thursday, they drew extensively from the classics, such as the pas de deux from "Corsaire." And the audiences that I encountered were most emotional—in the fanatic way of opera or sports fans—during a performance of "Giselle" earlier in the week. (I should add that I didn't have the chance to explore contemporary dance here. And it is here. ABT's Jose Manuel Carreño is staying for another week here to rehearse with the Danza Contemporanea de Cuba, which is performing in Mexico this month and will come to the Joyce Theater in the spring.) While the Cuban ballet community has its taste, we have ours. And this was made most clear with ABT's performances of Jerome Robbins's 1944 masterpiece "Fancy Free." It would be incorrect to say that this work went over like a lead balloon. But the response was tepid the first night, slightly warmer the next. Why? One easy answer is that "Fancy Free" doesn't boast the pyrotechnics and bravura that go a long way here, no matter the dance genre. The lusty flamenco dancer Antonio El Pipa gave a traditional solo performance that elicited the longest standing ovation I saw all week. What works is a big finish; nuance and subtlety, not so much. Another answer to the question of "Fancy Free" is that the orchestra didn't capture the electricity and pop of the Leonard Bernstein score. Again, a surprise, given that the Cubans are know for their musicianship and love of jazz. But as ABT conductor Ormsby Wilkins—who faced the task of preparing the local orchestra—pointed out, this is jazz through Bernstein's prism of classical music and life in New York circa World War II. "Bernstein used all these other influences," said Mr. Wilkins, citing Aaron Copland among them. "He was a highly trained classical musician. It's not just that the music is jazz inflected. It's hard to come to terms with initially." The complexity of the music is parallel to the complexity in the dance itself. Robbins combined ballet, modern dance and Broadway in his choreography. When it was created, this ballet was a reflection of contemporary life: three sailors on shore leave in Manhattan. (No princes, no swans, no undead jilted girls.) The comedic gestures are connected to mime but speak from a Broadway vocabulary. For American audiences, "Fancy Free" can call to mind the history of World War II and an era of vigor. It is a healthy dose of New York nostalgia, which everyone has for their own New York experience, even if they haven't lived in the city. The Edward Hopper-esque set can inspire visual art references. And for decades, audiences have seen "Fancy Free" with the knowledge of the art that was created after it, such as "On the Town" and "West Side Story." It wasn't the hit of the festival here, but "Fancy Free" did the work of cultural exchange. It's a work steeped in and evocative of American life. The dancers who performed it did not get the applause or the laughs they are used to, but they brought something new, American and important to Cuba. If not this, then why bother? An argument could be made that when you go to Cuba, bring the showstoppers. But every ballet-speaking nation has ballerinas who can do 32 fouette turns and men who can do barrel turns. We certainly do—and then some. ABT's Xiomara Reyes (a supreme classicist) and Herman Cornejo (whose jumps are of superhero quality) danced the pas de deux from "Diana and Acteon" to an uproar of applause on Thursday night. Ultimately, ABT's work was one page in a festival that offers a broad brochure of styles and companies. And it was important to have something distinctive to show in a week that included dancers from the Royal Ballet, National Ballet of Canada and the Stuttgart Ballet. If this festival were set up for tourism, it would be a marvelous way to see the sights of Havana and an array of ballet companies. Each evening offered two, sometimes three performances. But while the festival invites international performers, the audience is largely domestic. Tickets are obtained (so I'm told) by standing in line on the day they go on sale, or by purchase at the door, which was possible on several evenings. Ticketmaster, not surprisingly, has yet to be involved. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| A Cuban-American Cultural Exchange Comes Full Circle - New York Times Posted: 07 Nov 2010 02:56 PM PST HAVANA — Kevin McKenzie, artistic director of American Ballet Theater, stood by a fluted pillar in a lofty studio at the National Ballet School here on Friday, keeping time with his hands as a group of male students practiced jetés in a circle. "You are leaning in too much," he told the dancers. "Keep your shoulders even. Dance forward in the space around the circle." Gian Carlos Pérez, 16, one of more than a dozen young men and women in Mr. McKenzie's two-hour master class, took the advice to heart, saying he would rethink the way he approached leaps. "That class was unforgettable," he added. "If only he could come back and do more." If the jetés provided a memorable lesson for Mr. Pérez, circles — artistic, personal and historical — were a dominant motif last week, when Ballet Theater returned to the homeland of Alicia Alonso, the Cuban ballerina who danced with the company during the 1940s. The visit also had the air of a valediction: Ms. Alonso, energetic but virtually blind, turns 90 in December. "There is a sense that this is the closing of a circle," Mr. McKenzie said. "Alicia has closure. She is acknowledged worldwide as one of the great ballerinas of history." Ballet Theater, which performed here twice last week as part of the 22nd International Ballet Festival, last visited Cuba as a company in 1960, shortly before the United States severed commercial and diplomatic ties with this Communist country. The visit was part of a recent spate of cultural exchanges, including a weeklong residency in October by the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. American officials say they favor more person-to-person contacts with Cuba, despite a lack of progress since President Obama took office toward ending decades of political animosity. Four Ballet Theater principals, including the Cuban-born dancer José Manuel Carreño, stayed on to dance in weekend gala performances after the rest of the 80-strong contingent left on Friday. Eight dancers from New York City Ballet, performing under the auspices of the Cuban Artists Fund, also performed during the festival, which ended on Sunday. Despite the embargo Ms. Alonso strove to ensure that the loop connecting Cuban and American ballet endured. Mr. McKenzie came to Cuba to dance Siegfried in "Swan Lake" in 1986 and was struck by the talent of a young Cuban dancer who, he discovered years later, was Mr. Carreño. Mr. Carreño joined American Ballet Theater in 1995 and is credited by colleagues with helping the company reach a new level. "He's an incredible partner and amazingly coordinated," Mr. McKenzie said, adding that he had helped the other dancers improve their skills at turns. Last week Mr. Carreño was back in his hometown, on the cusp of retiring from the company, signing autographs and enchanting the Cuban audience with a sexy, Latin-infused solo in Jerome Robbins's "Fancy Free." During a frenetic five days the American and Cuban dancers got a taste of each other's worlds. Americans took class with Cuban teachers, compared notes on technique and musicality, worked with Cuban stage crews and donated shoes and other dance material. The Americans were impressed by the Cuban dancers' spirit and athleticism and the judgment and diversity of their audience; the Cubans were fascinated by the range of choreography and the apparently effortless fluidity with which the Americans moved. "We're just not used to seeing this kind of choreography and when we do, it makes a huge impression," said Yonah Junior Acosta, a soloist with the Cuban National Ballet and a nephew of Carlos Acosta, a principal guest artist with the Royal Ballet in London. "We'd love to dance other things, like MacMillan," he added, referring to the British choreographer Kenneth MacMillan. As the visit wore on, the question lingered of how to strengthen the bonds forged in Havana. Mr. McKenzie said he was pondering the possibility of choreographic workshops and other educational programs. "With every closing of a circle, you begin a new one," he said. "It's got to pass to the next generation." The current generation of Cuban dancers has made its mark on the international stage, from Mr. Carreño and Xiomara Reyes, also a principal with Ballet Theater, to the sisters Lorena Feijóo of the San Francisco Ballet and Lorna Feijóo of the Boston Ballet. But the pride that comes with their international fame is bittersweet. Every dancer who goes overseas leaves behind a gap. "We lose so many wonderful dancers," Mr. Acosta said. "It is such a shame." Ms. Reyes, who left Cuba just shy of her 20th birthday in 1992, closed her own circle last week when she was reunited with a half sister and two nieces, as well as many people who had trained and worked with her as a young dancer. She said she was so nervous about seeing her city again and dancing before the expectant, and exigent, Cuban public that she had barely slept. Carlos Alberto, wardrobe designer for the National Ballet School, where Ms. Reyes studied, wept when she ducked into his cramped costume department on Thursday. "My girl, my girl, so many years," he muttered, clasping her head. "She left, and she realized her goal," Mr. Alberto said later. "And now she has come back." Ms. Reyes took the stage of the Karl Marx Theater that night to a surge of applause and danced the Diana and Acteon pas de deux with the Argentine dancer Herman Cornejo. The two drew cheers from an audience of 4,400, thrilled to see a ballerina who left at the beginning of her career and had returned to dance for them at her zenith. As applause filled the vast theater, Ms. Reyes curtsied to receive a white bouquet. Then she flitted to the edge of the stage, bowed her head low and laid the flowers before her, a gesture of thanks to the public from whom she had, for so long, been parted. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| Posted: 07 Nov 2010 09:41 AM PST Published: Sunday, November 07, 2010, 12:53 PMThe Warren County Cultural & Heritage Commission announces the winners of the 15th Annual Skylands Scenic Beauty Photo Contest. Entries were received from photographers throughout the area's northwest region. Over $2,100 was awarded in cash prizes.The Best of Show winner for this year's contest was Patricia Abbott from Washington. Abbott won Best in Show in 2008 and First Places in 2007 and 2006. Winners in the Professional category include: Jean M. Perry from Saylorsburg, Pa., First Place; Paula Jensen from Blairstown, Second Place; and Pat Mannon from Washington, Third Place. Honorable Mentions were won by Don Myles of Belvidere, Peggy Niece from Oxford and Patty Wright-Farrini from Washington. Other professional participants include: Cathy Conroy, Stephen Flood, Jay Halmi, Trevor Hodgson, Gordon Perry, Jane H. Rapp, Julia Rose-Dick, Kathleen Rupff, George Slack, Carol Southerland, and Bonnie Stanislaw. Winners in the Amateur category include: Bill Hoffmann from Hackettstown, First Place; Joan F. White from Oxford, Second Place; and Sue Ellen Mikowski of Great Meadows with the Third Place Ribbon. Honorable Mention awards were received by Craig A. Ritzer from Hackettstown and Barbara Tripi from Sparta. Other Amateur contestants include: Benjamin Betti, Len Carducci, Susanna Davidovich, Mary J. Finken, Maria Liloia, Patricia MacCallum, Barbara Polhemus, Mildred Rice, Rozina Smith, and Marina Zindel. The Student category winners include: Jessie Fabian in First Place, Jessica Reid in Second Place, Peter Liolia IV in Third Place. Honorable Mention winners include Shayna Reed and Juliet Reid. Barbara Pohl, professor of Graphic Design and Multimedia at Centenary College, served as the judge for the 15th Annual Skylands Scenic Beauty Photo Contest. The 15th Annual Skylands Scenic Beauty Photo exhibit will be displayed until Jan. 13, 2011 in the Wayne Dumont Jr. Administration Hall Gallery, on Route 519 south in White Township. The gallery is open to the public during regular weekday business hours. For more information, call 908-453-4381 or visit www.wcchc.org. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| You are subscribed to email updates from cultural - Bing News To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
0 comments:
Post a Comment