The Art of Ballet

by Mark Edward Perugini

Then again, the Coliseum, young as it is, has already created dance traditions for itself, and of the best sort. Was it not there first of all that we were enchanted with the Russian ballet? They were not the first Russian dancers seen in London, for Mlle. Kyasht and Mme. Pavlova had preceded them; but they were the first collective example of Russian ballet from the Moscow and Petrograd Opera-Houses, and it was here we first saw Mme. Karsavina, one of the most supremely finished and élégante dancers it has been London’s good fortune to see. What lightness, what purity and dignity of style, what perfect execution and perfect ease, and what poetic charm!

Her variation in the “Sylphide” was a revelation of classic art of the Taglioni school, and howsoever some may prefer one “school” to another there must always be much to be said for a training which assists the evolution of such artists, for at least it is a sure training with sure and gracious results.

There is something in tradition when all it said and done, and one has to remember that while even an iconoclastic “Futurist” cannot help creating tradition in attempting to do away with it, and while pure ballet-dancing may not be the one and only kind which can give delight, it must command the respect that is due to any art which respects its own traditions, and can produce such dancers as Mme. Karsavina and those who were first associated with her at the Coliseum.

More recently, we were to see at the same house, “Sumurun!” It was strange indeed to think that a London audience could be held by some seven scenes of a play in which not a word was spoken; it was a tour de force of the art of miming, but then also it was a revelation of the art of stage effect. The decorative scheme, with its simple lines and ample space, was unlike anything that we had had before—unless perhaps in the nobler art of Mr. Gordon Craig—and the colour schemes, mostly of a curiously dry, cool note, were a pleasant change from the traditional attempts at a stage realism that is only too often too unreal.

Since then too there was, of course, the appearance of that dainty Dresden-china dancer, Mme. Karina in a graceful little dance-scena, “The Colour of Life,” the expressive music of which was by Miss Dora Bright. Mme. Karina, another dancer who hails from Denmark, won instant appreciation for the beauty of her work, and is indeed notable for her precision, grace and distinction.

Yet again has Mlle. Adeline Génée made welcome reappearances at the Coliseum, especially in “La Danse”—first produced, I believe, at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York—which formed a series of representations of the dances and dancers of the historic past—forming practically a collection of little cameos of the dance, having a distinct educational value and presenting a veritable re-creation of all the great stars of Ballet in the past, from Prévôt to Taglioni; in all of which the world-famous dancer exhibited the same high qualities of artistry that she had ever done.

But among the many dance productions seen at this handsome house probably the two most satisfactory judged as ballet were the production of Mr. Wilhelm’s “Camargo,” with Mlle. Génée in the title-rôle; and M. Kosloff’s production of “Scheherazade,” the two forming an outstanding contrast in one’s memory. The former, with the quiet dignity, soft light and sumptuous stage embellishments of furniture and décors, and the dream-like quality assumed by the characters in this rich and harmonious setting. One found in it something of that visionary quality which gave the peculiar charm to the “Versailles” production which I spoke of in referring to the Empire. The music and the acting were so expressive that one did not miss the words, and yet half-consciously one knew they were not there just because of the dream-like atmosphere which the music itself so helped to create.

The royal grace and dignity of Louis-Quinze, the butterfly vivacity of Camargo herself, and the more vital and quieter actions of her young soldier friend for whose misdeeds she pleads for pardon from the King, were all but dream figures in a dream, and it was as if the veil of the past had been suddenly drawn aside and one had a glimpse of a century seen through the half light of early dawn. Once more Mlle. Génée excelled herself in doing apparently impossible things with consummate ease, and once more one was glad to welcome the sensitive, expressive and scholarly work of so accomplished a musician as Miss Dora Bright.

There was nothing of the cool and dream-like quality, however, about Mons. Kosloff’s “Scheherazade.” Exotic, bizarre, palpitant with warmth and colour, the production stormed the imagination with its extravagance of hue and tone, even as the tangled rhythms and seductive melodies of the music captured the hearing and through it subdued the mind to a sort of dazzled wonder. It was a stupendous achievement, the more so in that it was brief.

At various times and at various places we have seen in London during the past ten years or so every form of dance and ballet it would seem could possibly exist. “Sand” dances; “Buck” dances; “Hypnotic” dances; “Salome” dances; “Vampire” dances; “Apache,” “Classic,” “Viennese,” Turkish, Egyptian, Russian, “Inspirational” dancers, and even English ballet-dancers in an all-British ballet once at the handsome Palladium; and also at the Court and Savoy, where Stedman staged some delightful ballets performed, under the direction of Miss Lilian Leoffeler and Mr. Marshall Moore, by English dancers. Not only at the regular vaudeville houses and theatres, however, is to be found genuine appreciation of the British dance and dancer. Elsewhere an English school of dance has been founded, and that in a form for which the English nation was famous in Shakespeare’s time.