Живи, а то хуже будет
А вот та страница, откуда я весной хорошо потаскала статьи из Globe and Mail (увы, там лежала подшивка лишь с 1985 года до наших дней), благополучно закрылась на большой-пребольшой замок. Не могу я туда теперь попасть, потому что у меня нет докУмента, доступа, нужного гражданства, и вообще крокодилам здесь ходить воспрещается. Ну и пожалуйста. К счастью, все самое ценное я оттуда предусмотрительно утащила, я же запасливый человек. Вот сейчас пороюсь в закромах и выложу очередную статью про Константина. Это рецензия на вечер его сольных работ, состоявшийся в октябре 1987 года в Торонто. Нет, знаете, я выложу даже две статьи, чтобы можно было сравнить и проникнуться. Первая статья: из Globe and Mail, автор - Дейдре Келли; вторая статья - из Toronto Star, автор - Майкл Крэбб. От себя скажу, что статью Келли я нежно люблю за эту великолепную характеристику Константина (когда-то я ее уже цитировала): "Patsalas <...> was well known for ballets such as Canciones, L'ile Inconnue, Piano Concerto and Rite of Spring and as an intimate of the National's late great artistic director, Erik Bruhn". Так исчерпывающе, что и добавить нечего.
It was carnival time at Harbourfront's Premiere Dance Theatre on Tuesday night when choreographer Constantin Patsalas unveiled a motley collection of his own works, including the world premiere of a knee-buckling "punk" ballet called Exposures: Jawohl!
The packed house of Toronto politicos and ballet stars may have been drawn equally by art and controversy. Patsalas, as resident choreographer of the National Ballet of Canada was well known for ballets such as Canciones, L'ile Inconnue, Piano Concerto and Rite of Spring and as an intimate of the National's late great artistic director, Erik Bruhn. But Patsalas' artistry and connections did not prevent him from leaving the National amid a storm of recriminations. (He is currently suing the company for wrongful dismissal.) Tuesday's performance could then, depending on the point of view, be construed as either an innocent showcase or an elaborate thumbing of the nose at the National powers-that-be.
Patsalas used some of his past connections to furnish his show. Some dancers, such as Karyn Tessmer, Gizella Witkowsky and apprentice Lidya Green, were plucked from the ranks of the National Ballet while others were brought in from the National Ballet School. One dancer, David MacGillivray, came in from Ballet British Columbia. Others such as Lloyd Adams (he was in the original cast of Cats) and former National dancers Amalia Schelhorn, Vanessa Harwood came from Toronto's independent community.
The carnival spirit was abetted by Patsalas' love of theatricality and grand-scale variety. The music was loud, melodramatic, sentimental, urbane; the costumes vivid, fanciful, diaphanous, provocative. There was a cat's cradle display of rope, a gallery of photographic images and props that included an assembly of wheeled toys, a pair of black stilettos, a bunch of red roses and a black and white umbrella. The only thing missing was a pink elephant, but, had the theatre doors been wide enough, Patsalas might have found a way to bring one in.
The Harbourfront show (which ends Saturday) presents a new style of dance-making from Patsalas, incorporating the graceful esthetics of ballet with the grand spectacle of opera and embracing wit and humor perhaps to keep detractors at bay.
While Exposures: Jawohl! is an extravagent departure for Patsalas, it could also be called a long-awaited return to his roots. Like German new-dance artists Pina Bausch, Reinhild Hoffmann and Susanne Linke, Patsalas is a student of the Folkwang University at Essen, the famed experimental modern dance school founded by Kurt Joos. After becoming a member of the National Ballet of Canada in 1972, Patsalas concentrated on classical technique, leaving experimentation for his European classmates. Now he appears to have rediscovered the subversiveness that lies at the heart of exciting dance. In Exposures, Patsalas destroys the traditional forms presented in the first half of the program (particularly in 1985's Notturni, 1981's Bolero and 1987's Currents) and appears to triumph over certain esthetic conventions and arrangements. He infuses the whole with a strong dose of raw emotion and sexual energy and aspires to dramatic expression by folding a fragmented, multi-lingual narrative sсript into the dance spectacle. What emerges is a collage in revue form, with dream- like images and many parallel actions structured on the principle of tension and release and leading toward a vague idea of salvation.
Shaping his ideas is a pastiche of songs by punk chanteuse Nina Hagen. A German-born experimentalist, Hagen has a classically trained voice which she uses to puncture operatic tradition and jostle the melody lines of pop and rock music. In Hagen, Patsalas appears to have found a soul-mate but, so far, lacks her consistency and sense of purpose. Is he using the Harbourfront show as a purging, or is this the start of something new?
Patsalas' vision might just be too overblown for a 450-seat theatre like PDT. Seen up close, his work betrays a questionable taste for the rococo, a saccharine sentimentality and a fondness for romantic cliche. When his themes are worn and second-hand (and they often are), his choreography suffers.
Back at the National, Patsalas' successor, Glen Tetley, is putting the finishing touches on La Ronde, a ballet that will have its world premiere at O'Keefe Centre next week. It will be interesting to see if the National's loss might also be its gain.
German avant-garde rock star Nina Hagen might seem an unlikely inspiration for a ballet choreographer but then Constantin Patsalas has always had interesting musical tastes.
His roots may be in classical ballet but his imagination is clearly marching to a very contemporary beat.
It's more than a year since a discontented Patsalas withdrew from the National Ballet of Canada where he had been resident choreographer and latterly artistic adviser. But if Patsalas has been denied the human and material resources of a large classical ballet troupe he has not allowed this to dampen his creative urge.
The five-part all-Patsalas program on view this week at Harbourfront's Premiere Dance Theatre includes two brand new pieces and one of them at least, Exposures: Jawohl!, danced to Nina Hagen, shows that the choreographer is exploring new territory.
Despite some creaky joints, Exposures: Jawohl! offers a surreal post-punk cabaret, a raunchy spectacle which though thin on content suggests that Patsalas is significantly loosening his allegiance to his classical ballet roots.
Besides setting his dancers in motion by such conventional forms of locomotion as running and jumping, in Exposures Patsalas also puts them on skateboards, unicycles, pogo sticks, roller-skates and even crutches. Instead of wafting dresses and sleek tights, Patsalas, doubling as costume designer, dresses them in tiger-striped briefs, black leather leotards, threatening metallic bras and pants cut off at the top rather than the bottom.
The sheer theatricality of Exposures helps Patsalas even the odds for attention in an often uneven match against the gripping voice of Hagen.
Currents, the other new work, is slight by comparison. Former National Ballet principal Vanessa Harwood dallies with three energetic escorts in a dance that seems inappropriately accompanied by Andre Jolivert's Second Trumpet Concerto.
Patsalas is much more in tune with his chosen music in Notturni, a sometimes wistful but evocative work he choreographed for the Banff Centre two years ago. It, however, is more typical of the neo-classical choreographer we remember from Patsalas' National Ballet days. Exposures reflects a freer, more adventurous mind.
Patsalas evokes carnival spirit
It was carnival time at Harbourfront's Premiere Dance Theatre on Tuesday night when choreographer Constantin Patsalas unveiled a motley collection of his own works, including the world premiere of a knee-buckling "punk" ballet called Exposures: Jawohl!
The packed house of Toronto politicos and ballet stars may have been drawn equally by art and controversy. Patsalas, as resident choreographer of the National Ballet of Canada was well known for ballets such as Canciones, L'ile Inconnue, Piano Concerto and Rite of Spring and as an intimate of the National's late great artistic director, Erik Bruhn. But Patsalas' artistry and connections did not prevent him from leaving the National amid a storm of recriminations. (He is currently suing the company for wrongful dismissal.) Tuesday's performance could then, depending on the point of view, be construed as either an innocent showcase or an elaborate thumbing of the nose at the National powers-that-be.
Patsalas used some of his past connections to furnish his show. Some dancers, such as Karyn Tessmer, Gizella Witkowsky and apprentice Lidya Green, were plucked from the ranks of the National Ballet while others were brought in from the National Ballet School. One dancer, David MacGillivray, came in from Ballet British Columbia. Others such as Lloyd Adams (he was in the original cast of Cats) and former National dancers Amalia Schelhorn, Vanessa Harwood came from Toronto's independent community.
The carnival spirit was abetted by Patsalas' love of theatricality and grand-scale variety. The music was loud, melodramatic, sentimental, urbane; the costumes vivid, fanciful, diaphanous, provocative. There was a cat's cradle display of rope, a gallery of photographic images and props that included an assembly of wheeled toys, a pair of black stilettos, a bunch of red roses and a black and white umbrella. The only thing missing was a pink elephant, but, had the theatre doors been wide enough, Patsalas might have found a way to bring one in.
The Harbourfront show (which ends Saturday) presents a new style of dance-making from Patsalas, incorporating the graceful esthetics of ballet with the grand spectacle of opera and embracing wit and humor perhaps to keep detractors at bay.
While Exposures: Jawohl! is an extravagent departure for Patsalas, it could also be called a long-awaited return to his roots. Like German new-dance artists Pina Bausch, Reinhild Hoffmann and Susanne Linke, Patsalas is a student of the Folkwang University at Essen, the famed experimental modern dance school founded by Kurt Joos. After becoming a member of the National Ballet of Canada in 1972, Patsalas concentrated on classical technique, leaving experimentation for his European classmates. Now he appears to have rediscovered the subversiveness that lies at the heart of exciting dance. In Exposures, Patsalas destroys the traditional forms presented in the first half of the program (particularly in 1985's Notturni, 1981's Bolero and 1987's Currents) and appears to triumph over certain esthetic conventions and arrangements. He infuses the whole with a strong dose of raw emotion and sexual energy and aspires to dramatic expression by folding a fragmented, multi-lingual narrative sсript into the dance spectacle. What emerges is a collage in revue form, with dream- like images and many parallel actions structured on the principle of tension and release and leading toward a vague idea of salvation.
Shaping his ideas is a pastiche of songs by punk chanteuse Nina Hagen. A German-born experimentalist, Hagen has a classically trained voice which she uses to puncture operatic tradition and jostle the melody lines of pop and rock music. In Hagen, Patsalas appears to have found a soul-mate but, so far, lacks her consistency and sense of purpose. Is he using the Harbourfront show as a purging, or is this the start of something new?
Patsalas' vision might just be too overblown for a 450-seat theatre like PDT. Seen up close, his work betrays a questionable taste for the rococo, a saccharine sentimentality and a fondness for romantic cliche. When his themes are worn and second-hand (and they often are), his choreography suffers.
Back at the National, Patsalas' successor, Glen Tetley, is putting the finishing touches on La Ronde, a ballet that will have its world premiere at O'Keefe Centre next week. It will be interesting to see if the National's loss might also be its gain.
Patsalas' mind marches to a contemporary beat
German avant-garde rock star Nina Hagen might seem an unlikely inspiration for a ballet choreographer but then Constantin Patsalas has always had interesting musical tastes.
His roots may be in classical ballet but his imagination is clearly marching to a very contemporary beat.
It's more than a year since a discontented Patsalas withdrew from the National Ballet of Canada where he had been resident choreographer and latterly artistic adviser. But if Patsalas has been denied the human and material resources of a large classical ballet troupe he has not allowed this to dampen his creative urge.
The five-part all-Patsalas program on view this week at Harbourfront's Premiere Dance Theatre includes two brand new pieces and one of them at least, Exposures: Jawohl!, danced to Nina Hagen, shows that the choreographer is exploring new territory.
Despite some creaky joints, Exposures: Jawohl! offers a surreal post-punk cabaret, a raunchy spectacle which though thin on content suggests that Patsalas is significantly loosening his allegiance to his classical ballet roots.
Besides setting his dancers in motion by such conventional forms of locomotion as running and jumping, in Exposures Patsalas also puts them on skateboards, unicycles, pogo sticks, roller-skates and even crutches. Instead of wafting dresses and sleek tights, Patsalas, doubling as costume designer, dresses them in tiger-striped briefs, black leather leotards, threatening metallic bras and pants cut off at the top rather than the bottom.
The sheer theatricality of Exposures helps Patsalas even the odds for attention in an often uneven match against the gripping voice of Hagen.
Currents, the other new work, is slight by comparison. Former National Ballet principal Vanessa Harwood dallies with three energetic escorts in a dance that seems inappropriately accompanied by Andre Jolivert's Second Trumpet Concerto.
Patsalas is much more in tune with his chosen music in Notturni, a sometimes wistful but evocative work he choreographed for the Banff Centre two years ago. It, however, is more typical of the neo-classical choreographer we remember from Patsalas' National Ballet days. Exposures reflects a freer, more adventurous mind.