The Afternoon of the Faun

The Afternoon of the faun Review

This was the first performance which Nijinsky choreographed he used a very different style of dance than when he performed for the Ballet Russes. He rejected all classical formalisation of ballet; the dancers danced in bare feet and moved in a very rigid constrained way with no lifts or reconcilable dance moved. It was a very uncomfortable piece to watch because I didn’t at times really understand what was happening particularly when he is dancing with the nymphs.

The Faun was very animalistic in the way he moved and his facial expressions the way he kept his hands closed also the sexual references you can understand why at the time (1912) it was such a controversial production.

The costumes and set by Leon Bakst are beautiful the colourful willow like trees do create a very other worldly feel to the play, the Greek references in the costumes are very clear with the floaty dresses that the nymphs wear.

All though it was interesting to watch a ballet performance that is so different and was really the beginnings of contemporary dance. I didn’t really enjoy the performance I didn’t like the way he moved to present the faun and I didn’t really feel that there was any dance there was a lot of movement across the stage but it was more like walking. I did however; enjoy the costumes they certainly presented a Grecian like world.

La Fille Mal Gardee Review

La Fille Mal Gardee: The Wayward Girl

This ballet was first performed 1^st July 1789 and is one of the oldest most important ballet to the modern ballet in repertory.

The opening scene of the performance with these life size chickens is very and sets the tone for the whole piece. Although at first I wasn’t sure if I liked the chickens they grew on me as I watched the rest of the performance. Which is wonderfully comical; the boy which the wayward girl is meant to marry shows his character so clearly through the way he dances, in a clumsy and immature way. Having her mother played by a man gives a pantomime feeling to the performance but that does not take away from the enjoyment of the piece.

I liked the way they used a lot of traditional character dancing the may pole dancing, clog dancing, and Morris dancing this reflected the age of the piece for before ballet was formed as we see it now it combined a lot of this traditional dancing with the ballet. I liked the use of props when dancing particularly when the wayward girl dances with the man she loves with the ribbon. It is as youthful and playful as young love should be. The characters within this performance are very strong which is why I enjoyed it so much you were drawn into their lives.

The costumes show the summertime so clearly with bright pinks, yellows, and blues with prints of gingham and stripes. The costumes work well together combining so that it creates a perfect picture of workers out in the field collecting the harvest.

Les Sylphides Review

Les Sylphides

This production is often confused with La Sylphide however; the only similarity is the dancing of Sylphs in a wood. This production is a full ballet blanc and is only half an hour long this is because it is a non narrative piece. There is only one male in the whole production and his identity is unknown he is only really there so that there can be lifts in the piece. Although this performance allowed the ballet dancing to be focused upon however, I didn’t really enjoy the piece I felt that they repeated a lot of the dance moves. It lacked emotion and the music does not change tone so the dance moves are all very gentle which reflects the Sylphs characters well but offers no excitement for the audience.

The costumes where pretty although I preferred the wings in La Sylphide they where a far better wing shape in this production I felt they were too small. I also didn’t like the sleeves they didn’t give a pleasing silhouette.

Overall I feel I prefer a ballet production with more substance which uses the dancing to tell a story not just dancing for the sake of dancing.

La Sylphide Review

Review La Sylphide

La Sylphide is considered a ballet blanc because there is a scene when all the chor of sylphs are in white it is considered the corner stone of the romantic ballet being the oldest surviving romantic ballet. Although it is a Danish ballet production with its premiere at Copenhagen, they choose to set it in Scotland I feel this helps to separate the real world from the fantastical. Giving the costumes grounding in the traditions of this world shows such a stark contrast to the fantasy world. Especially when you first see the Sylph in the hall which is quite gloomy and dark compared to her light floaty costume.

The dancing between James and the Sylph also shows the contrast between the two worlds for they never really dance together as if he is not allowed to touch her. It is not until Madge gives James the scarf and he puts it around the Sylph that he actually touches her unfortunately to her doom. These death scene is very emotional the way we see the Sylph lose her strength as the other Sylphs try to help her onto point but she cannot she is so weak.

It was lovely to see the way the romantic tutu moves as that is the tutu I’m going to be making. The romantic tutu does move far more gently than the plate I feel it portrays the ethereal character of the Sylph well.

I thoroughly enjoyed this production it was funny but emotional the story was very clear and easy to understand through the mime.

Making the Bodice

Making the Bodice

To help the bodice to be even more skin tight the panels where on the bias a part from the CF and CB however for the Side Front seams the grain lines direction was towards the CF and on the Side Back the grain line was towards the CB. Therefore it was very important that when I was drawing out my pattern on the top fabric that I made sure each of the bias lines where in the right direction. I found this fine on the cotton drill however; it was very difficult to work with the slipper satin because it was like water the slightest adjustment and the grain line became off centre. So that the fabric did not move too much and all the air bubbles would come out I had press it over. To prevent any more air bubbles getting into the fabric I cut it on the ironing board using the cotton drill as my pattern pieces. Using this type of fabric has expanded my knowledge for third year so that I will know how to handle slippery fabrics. I found that using a smaller iron boarding made it very difficult to keep the slipper satin straight so I had to pin and weigh the fabric down. I discovered the importance of using a clean iron as well because I found that when the steam wasn’t hot enough lime scale came out on the fabric thus causing wastage.

I also found that when I was pinning the cotton drill and slipper satin together that when I pinned in the middle it would leave pin marks in the fabric even when I tried to iron them out. So the left side panels I made sure that I just pinned in the seams. This will help me in the future when using similar fabrics to remember to always put pins in the seams.

Pinning the panel pieces was also a difficult task because each piece was so curved the SB was particularly difficult because it was so curved and I found that it was a little short to match up the design lines so I had to redraw the design line at the top.

Once the bodice was sewn and over locked I could start boning the bodice. I was important to remember that a ballet costume should look as good on the inside as on the outside. Therefore everything needs to be neat.

I developed my knowledge of different ways to bone bodices for in the corsets I used fell seams but here we are putting the bones in channels made from ribbon and then herringboning them to the seams of the bodice. When measuring the length of the seam line for the bones I had to pull it slightly so that when the bones are put in the bodice there is a little tension. I then had to cut the bones 2cms shorter than the actual length of the seams. I found when sewing on the piping that I should have cut the bones just that little bit smaller this would have made the piping easier to sew on. However, I will know this for the future.

I am pleased with my herringbone stitch it is very even so the inside of the bodice does look neat.

Something I have certainly developed is my time keeping as I planned to have one day to do my piping I however, found that it took me three days and this was not because I was time wasting. But simply because it took longer than I expected therefore I am going to take this into consideration when writing up the rest of my time table.

I have learnt how to sew in piping cord so that it can be adjusted easily if the artist changes size. I am not completely pleased with my piping because you can see some of the stitch lines when I sewed it into the bias strips. I did not notice how bad it was until I cut down the excess I then tried to adjust it but there was too little fabric left for me to adjust it. This is certainly a skill I need to learn if I want to produce beautiful pieces of work I need to check everything twice before I get to a point in which I cannot change it. My slipstitching of the bias tape is much neater and I have managed to keep it at a fairly equal size across the bodice.

This has certainly developed my understanding of how to sew something far more neatly and I how to take your time over something so that it looks as it should. Although I have made mistake I know where they have been therefore it has enabled me to develop my learning.

I then sewed on the hooks and bars.

Once this was done I could pin it to the manikin however, I found that it was about 2cms to small even though before I had sewn on the piping I had checked the bodice to see if it would fit and it did although it was a little tight. So at this late stage I realised that I would have to take the costume out otherwise it wouldn’t fit on the manikin and the romantic tutu was too big.

So after measuring it I found it was 4cms too small so I had to unpick the piping at the S/S and the S/S panel. I then measured 1cm in on each side of the panel and pinned together before sewing it I checked that it fitted on the manikin and it was fine so I sewed it together. I found where I had unpicked that the stitching left holes in the bodice which I’m annoyed about because my bodice now doesn’t look as neat as it should. I then had to re-sew the piping.

Having to do all this re-sewing set back my time plan because I had wanted to attach my bodice and tutu by now which is frustrating because I now have less time to sew on my decoration. However, I have learnt from my mistake and I should have checked earlier on whether it fitted my manikin so that I would not have to correct my mistake as such a later date.

Now that it fits my manikin I was able to sew on my straps these where placed on the highest point of the bodice and then backstitched and herringboned in place.

Making the Pattern for the Bodice

Making the pattern

For this costume I am making a 12 panelled bodice ballet costumes have this many panels because they are more stream line so that they are skin tight. Making the pattern for the bodice has certainly helped me develop my skills at looking at the shape of the body to create curves which flatter the shape of the body. This is particularly important for the bodice because ballet dancers are often very slight and do not have a very curved figure. Therefore, to create more of a curve you have to take the lines of the seams in little at the waist and then gently flick out at the hips.

I found it hard at first to mark at the seams with the dressmakers mark tape because I would flick the curves out too much at the waist as can be seen here it is at too extreme an angle. Also the CF is too narrow I needed to adjust all the seams so that they were equally balanced for the shape looked to oblong. Although the seams at the back where going to be a little bit bigger as long as it’s not to bigger a difference then it doesn’t matter.

The shape of the bodice looks so much better now the curves flick out less severely and the shape around the bust is far more flattering. However, when I started pinning on my calico I found that I had marked out too many panels, but because I had already started pinning the calico to the front so I could only adjust the back panels. However, I do not think that it has made my bodice look unbalanced in the future I will have to remember to count all the panels before I start pinning on the calico.

The next stage is drawing out the seam lines for each pattern piece I found for the last project of draping on the stand that getting these lines neat is hard. So I tried to improve my lines by not drawing where the pins were so that I didn’t get an uneven line. However, when I took it off the manikin I found that the lines where still a little shaky so I tried to even them out a little. This is clearly something I need to develop in my learning.

Inspiration for Costume

Ballet Costume I am Making

The inspiration for my costume is the ballet production La Sylphide which is a ballet blanc because all the chor are in white. The costumes are for Sylphs so they are ethereal creatures who live in the woods therefore our costumes have to have this delicate magical feel too them. For my costume I will be adding a little bit of colour as I am going to create blue petal like shapes which are being blown across the bodice and down the romantic tutu.

You can see the delicacy in the costume the way the romantic tutu moves and creates soft floaty movements as she lifts her leg and dances. I need to make a costume that has that delicacy for ballet costumes are not meant to look like they have been made with human hands. This is a skill which I am going to have to develop because I need to learn to take my time with costumes however; I also need to develop my skills at being quicker at producing my costumes.

Swan Lake Les Ballet Trockadero

Swan Lake Les Ballets Trockadero

This was another performance which challenged my view of how ballet should be presented. At first I was a little shocked to see these men perform en travesti the roles of both male and female. I had never thought it was possible for men to go up on point because they are heavier than women. Although I agree with their statement now that the comedy ‘enhances rather than mocks the spirit of dance as an art form, delighting and amusing the most knowledgeable, as well as novices, in the audiences.’ However, at first I thought it was mocking the spirit of the ballet and a bit cheesy with over the top miming, but it won me over and I did find myself laughing at the signets. It was clever, how they took the sterotypes of the way ballet presents its self and made it comical. For instance when the 4 signets dance in unison the exaggeration of the head movement and the way they placed the smaller dancer on the end exaggerating the difference between the other dancers.

I feel that the thing that really helped me to appreciate the skill of the ballet dancers was watching Margret Fonteyn perform the second act of Swan Lake which was just incredible she dances with such power and precision. The dance choreography for the Trockadero company was very true to the original despite the comic element. Even when they fell comically they got up instantly and continued with their dance steps highlighting their skill as dancers.

However, despite all this I still would always prefer to see the traditional ballet. I felt that the Trockadero in spite of their skills were still closer to pantomime in style rather than a beautiful ballet performance.

Swan Lake Matthew Bourne

Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake

I had never seen this version of Swan Lake seeing it however, has developed my understanding of ballet and given me a wider perspective of the different ways a traditional ballet can be presented. I had heard this production described as the ‘gay` ballet therefore, I was a little uncertain of what I should expect. It was helpful to watch the documentary on Hardtalk as it gave me a greater understanding of his background and how he actually wanted the production to be viewed; that the Prince is drawn by the freedom and beauty of the male swan not necessarily in a sexual way. Bourne really feels that the most important thing is the story he doesn’t want the story to be written in the programme but the story needs to be on stage. I understand what he means because often when watching traditional ballet the details of the story line are not clear.

I was quite surprised at how much I enjoyed the performance it was very different to the traditional story line of Swan Lake, I felt that it was far more like a theatre performance than a ballet. The way they danced was more of a combination of ballet and contemporary dance there was no point work. The emotions are shown so clearly between the characters something which was really lacking in the first Swan Lake performance we watched. The scenes between the Prince and his mum are so powerful the way he just wants to hug her to feel that emotional bond however, she completely rejects him. Comparing this to the way the swan allows and shows him to move as he does.

There is not that magical feeling to the production which is essential to the traditional Swan Lake, I feel this practically highlighted by the scene when we first encounter the swans. It is set in a park with no eerie mist over the lake. This for me shows that there is no real sexual tension between the swan and the Prince because they are real swan’s not magical swans which turn into men at midnight.

The costumes where beautiful but not at all like the traditional ballet costume they where elegant without being over the top and highly decorated. The Queen’s costumes reminded me of the 50s style the circle style skirt allowed for a lot of movement. I liked the way they altered the costumes so that they went from being servants to courtiers, just by changing the accessories. The costumes are unified in the colour palette of blacks, whites and reds this means that the whole performance has one style unlike the first Swan Lake we saw where the colours went from being pastels to bright colours. The male swan costumes where very masculine although we didn’t get the full impact of how the tassels moved because we watched it on film.

I feel that watching all these different ballet productions of Swan Lake has enabled me to develop my own view of what ballet is and whether it is just about the point work and tutus or is it about the telling of stories. Although I did miss the classical style of ballet I did enjoy this production for his humour and strong emotions which where conveyed so powerfully through every look and dance move.