Mariinsky II (New Theatre)

Today the ballets of British choreographer Wayne McGregor adorn the playbills of the world’s leading ballet companies – the Opéra de Paris, the Royal Ballet in Great Britain, New York City Ballet, the Nederlands Dans Theater and Russia’s Bolshoi Theatre, invariably amazing audiences. Through his interest in modern technology, in his productions, the choreographer tries to produce a dialogue between dance and the latest multimedia achievements. In his ballets, alongside the dancers there are computer-generated figures and 3D architecture, digital video and animation are employed. And all of this in combination with original plastique. McGregor’s interest in the mechanics of movement produces enchanting results – refined body combinations in duets and the flow of mechanical poses you cannot draw your eyes from as they flow from one to the next. And despite the pure refinement of the beauty of the dance you have a sense of absolutely natural movement – the plastique reality is bewitching, it draws the audience into its own magnetic field that is created not by external energy coming from the music or the plot but from the form of pure dance in its own right. For his collaboration with the Mariinsky Ballet McGregor has selected the one-act ballet Infra, created in 2008 for the Royal Ballet in London. “The Mariinsky Ballet’s magnificent dancers give the choreography their own energy, they change its character,” says the choreographer, “When I chose to stage a ballet at the Mariinsky Theatre I really wanted something suitable specifically for this company that combines lofty technique and emotionality. Everyone has their own story to tell but in a crowd, these stories are lost and, when doing their everyday tasks, people can become really lonely. I have tried to get into the hidden depths of the human soul and show people’s inner sides – prosaic, imperfect and vulnerable. Infra is about that, it’s just a ballet about people.”
The translation from Latin means “under, underneath”. The contrasting chaos of people’s everyday inner lives is visualised in the designs by Julian Opie: high up, high above the stage plane there is a light diode screen with a series of conventional walking figureless digital people, while below the screen to the resonant and piercing monotony of the strings’ melody (composed by Max Richter) twelve dancers tell the story of desires and collisions, passing meetings and lost illusions, wrongful breakups and unattained happiness.
Olga Makarova

George Balanchine staged one of his most famous ballets for the company of the Opéra de Paris in 1947. Invited from beyond the ocean, the choreographer, in executing the French commission, was absolutely sure of himself: in this new work, as in most mature ballets by Balanchine, there was no plot, there were no human passions behind the dance, and only the music, its rhythm and structure determined the development of the choreographic image. The character of the dance was dictated by Georges Bizet’s youthful Symphony in C Major. Its sparkling lightness provided the name of the work – Le Palais de Cristal. It is true that soon after the ballet was brought to New York the invented title became forgotten, and for over half a century many leading ballet companies throughout the world have been proud to have Balanchine’s Symphony in C in their repertoires. This ballet is ideal for showcasing a company’s merits: the four parts of the ballet are staged for four pairs of soloists, and in this ballet dancers can dazzlingly show off their skills and take on the incredibly complex fiorituri of the shading in the Allegro, and proudly and majestically “sail” into the Adagio.
Olga Makarova