BALLET NEWS UPDATES

T-MOBILE BIG DANCE NEWS UPDATE

• BIG DANCE AWARDS £50,000 TO INSPIRING DANCE PROJECTS ACROSS LONDON

• SOUTHBANK CENTRE’S ‘DANCE ATLAS’ INSPIRES BIG WORLD DANCE

• BIG DANCE SCHOOLS PLEDGE MOBILISES SCHOOLS ACROSS THE WORLD

The T-Mobile Big Dance 2010 has awarded 50 grants to dance projects across the capital as part of its micro-grant scheme (see below for the full list). The successful projects will each receive £1,000 to help fund dance activities and events taking take place during the Big Dance week from 3 – 11 July 2010. Each grant will provide valuable support to artists and organisations.

Originally established by the Mayor of London’s Office in partnership with Arts Council England, The T-Mobile Big Dance 2010 is about promoting dance and increasing opportunities for more people to experience and participate in this extraordinarily wide-ranging artform and social activity.

London Mayor Boris Johnson says: 'Dance has reached the pinnacle of popularity, with celebs making ballroom cool again, awe inspiring street dance topping the TV talent shows, plus an astonishing array of styles on stage and brilliant choreographers working in the capital. We want to get as many people moving as possible – not just in July, but to 2012 and beyond - so give Big Dance a whirl.'

26 London boroughs will be benefit from the grants, by supporting London’s diverse communities.

Southbank Centre’s Dance Atlas launched on 1 April 2010. Members of the public as well as dance artists are invited to post videos of their favourite move onto the Dance Atlas from wherever they are around the world to contribute to an international collection of dance moves.

Luca Silvestrini, Artistic Director of Protein Dance will develop the choreography to the BIG WORLD DANCE inspired by the dance featured in the Dance Atlas to be performed by thousands of people on 10 July 2010. Silvistrini will draw on the material to create a dynamic and globally inspired routine. This choreography will be taught to thousands of people who will transform central London into a giant open air stage for an unmissable, show stopping dance on a gigantic scale, with the start line at Southbank Centre and the finishing line at Trafalgar Square.

The Big Dance Schools Pledge invites schools across London and around the world to take part in an extra 20 minutes of dance or physical activity each day from 5-9 July 2010. As part of the Big Dance Schools Pledge, all schools are encouraged to join worldwide to perform the Schools Pledge dance routine at 1pm on Friday 9 July as part of a Guinness World Record attempt. The choreography for this dance routine is available to download now and has been created by Hakeem Onibudo from Impact Dance. Available in four different skill levels, the routine has been designed to allow people of all ages and abilities to get involved

50 successful projects for the micro-grants:

Lauderdale House, Haringey
London Borough of Barking & Dagenham, Barking & Dagenham
Harlequins Rugby League Foundation and Combination, Richmond-upon-Thames
Carl Campbell Dance Company, Southwark
Etta Ermini Dance Theatre, Tower Hamlets
Combination Dance Company, Camden
Apsara Arts, Croydon
Montage Theatre Arts, Lewisham
Woodside School Sport partnership, Kent
Arts Depot, Barnet
Theatre Peckham, Southwark
Srishti Skills, Harrow
EPiC Arts, Tower Hamlets
Tropical Isles, Hackney
BOX SOCIAL theatre , Haringey
Thomas Goodwin& Petra Soor, exley
The Council of Asian people, Haringey
IRIE! Dance theatre, Lewisham
Shape, Wandsworth
Bromley Mytime, Bromley
Hypnotic, Brent
Hoxton Hall, Hackney/Newham
Annette Brandanger and Hayley Durwood, Southwark
Springs Dance Company, Lewisham
Entelechy Arts, Southwark
Camden School Sport Partnership, Camden
MIKS, Greenwich
Arte Latino Cultural Project, Greenwich
Chic Shake Shock, Greenwich
Community Link Up, Harrow
Granville Plus Youth Arts Centre, Brent
Union Dance Trust ltd., Westminster
Claremont Project, Islington
Chris Nash, Lewisham
Holborn Community Association, Camden
KNI Foundation, Waltham Forest
Hoop La la and Arabesque, Hackney
Dalston Tango, Hackney
Age Concern Hounslow, Hounslow
Rambert Dance Company, Hounslow
The Musical Museum, Hounslow
Battersea Arts Centre, Wandsworth
HIG HOOPS Hoola Hooping, Islington
Simon Rice, Camden
Pippa Emanuel, Wandsworth
Leanne Pero, Merton
Dream Arts, Harrow
London Borough of Hillingdon, Hillingdon
London Borough of Bromley, Bromley
Streatham Festival Association, Lambeth

 
I've decided to run again this press release from last year, just in case you haven't seen the link to the entire film, on the Chanel website.
 

CHANEL AND THE BALLETS RUSSES

Karl Lagerfeld, Creative Director of CHANEL, has designed costumes for 'The Dying Swan' and ‘Apollo’ as part of English National Ballet's Ballets Russes season at Sadler's Wells in June 2009. This year marks the centenary of the first performance by Serge Diaghilev's ballet at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris.

Karl Lagerfeld has always had a personal interest in ballet and admires the creativity of English National Ballet. He comments that "...as a child I was already impressed by old images of Anna Pavlova dancing the ballet" adding that "...the Ballet Russes were an influence for me".

The costume that has been exclusively created for ‘The Dying Swan’ will be worn by English National Ballet’s Senior Principal Dancer, Elena Glurdjidze. She says "we always say that the look is 50% of how you are going to dance, so it is very important to have a beautiful costume".

The tutu was made in the Lemarie Atelier, one of the specialized Parisian workshops which Chanel acquired in 1996. With the acquisition of six further Métiers d'Art – Desrues (costume jewellery maker), Massaro (shoe maker), Michel (milliner), Lesage (embroiderer), Goossens (goldsmith) and Guillet (floral finery maker) - Chanel has shown its attachment to companies which share the same core values of quality, exclusivity and innovation.

The costume took 3 women over 100 hours to create and is made from tulle and a variety of different feathers – over 2500 in total. It will have its debut on stage at Sadler's Wells on 16 June 2009. It will then be seen at a performance in St Paul's Cathedral on 30 June as part of the City of London Festival before going to Barcelona for performances in September at the Gran Teatro del Liceu.

During her final fitting, Elena danced 'The Dying Swan' for Karl in the Haute Couture Salon in Paris. Karl filmed the performance himself.

CHANEL has a long association with the ballet: Coco Chanel herself designed costumes for both 'Le Train Bleu' in 1924 and 'Apollon Musagete' in 1929. Indeed it was Chanel herself who, in Lagerfeld's words, "helped Diaghilev to stage [his ballet] again after World War I in 1919".

In addition to the exclusive costume for ‘The Dying Swan’, Karl Lagerfeld has designed the costumes for ‘Apollo’, also being performed as part of English National Ballets season of Ballets Russes.

These costumes were originally designed for the Monte Carlo Ballet in 1997 but have been reinterpreted and refitted for Thomas Edur and Agnes Oaks, the stars of the company. Their performance of ‘Apollo’ will be one of their last ever as they are due to retire this summer. They will be joined by fellow Senior Principle Dancers Daria Klimentova and Erina Takahashi.

Karl Lagerfeld explains why the costumes for these two dances are so varied: "The Dying Swan and Apollo are very different ballets. I didn't want to make something complicated for Apollo. I like it very clean, pure".

Thomas Edur and Agnes Oaks said of their fitting with Karl: “It was an extraordinary experience for us, we felt very honored to be invited to Chanel, to have these beautiful costumes fitted for us. To dance for Karl was very special, we have never danced in a situation like this before, and very rarely give performances like that”.

The entire film is available on Chanel.com