Ballets Russes
Revolutionary dance company
Ballets Russes was an influential ballet company based in Paris from 1909 to 1929, founded by impresario Sergei Diaghilev.
The company revolutionized ballet by commissioning bold collaborations between choreographers, composers, and visual artists—Stravinsky, Nijinsky, Picasso, Coco Chanel.
The Rite of Spring premiered with Ballets Russes and caused a riot.
The name is French for "Russian ballets."
Concert or opera organizer
- Monte CarloProbability estimation through randomness
- ParisFrance's chief city
- seasonsYear's four divisions
- toursGuided sightseeing expeditions
premieres · repertoire · patrons · collaborations · ensemble · orchestra · theater · cultural exchange
Spanish cubism co-founder
- MatisseFrench fauvism founder
- ChanelFrench haute couture house
- BraqueFrench cubism pioneer
- costumesClothes for assuming roles
sets · orientalism · exoticism · color · spectacle · headdress · tutu · silk
Favoring contemporary approaches
- cubismGeometric, fragmented visual style
- futurismStudy of tomorrow's possibilities
- experimentalTesting new methods
- pioneeringFirst to explore territory
revolutionary · Debussy · Ravel · collaboration · primitivism · scandal · shock · synthesis
Ballet's gravity defier
- St. PetersburgRussian Baltic port city
- PavlovaBallet icon, namesake dessert
- ProkofievTwentieth-century Russian composer
- folkloreInherited cultural narratives
Pontiac sports coupe line
- Rite of SpringModernist ballet about renewal
- ScheherazadeLegendary endless storyteller
Ballet's gravity defier
- neoclassicalReviving ancient aesthetic principles
- expressiveShowing feelings outwardly
- dramaticStrikingly expressive or sudden
- angularSharp-edged or rawboned
gestural · pantomime · narrative · abstraction · plastique · ensemble work
impresario
Concert or opera organizer
- Monte CarloProbability estimation through randomness
- ParisFrance's chief city
- seasonsYear's four divisions
tours · premieres · repertoire · patrons · collaborations · ensemble · orchestra · theater · cultural exchange · European tours
Picasso
Spanish cubism co-founder
costumes · sets · orientalism · exoticism · color · spectacle · headdress · tutu · silk · embroidery
modernism
Favoring contemporary approaches
- cubismGeometric, fragmented visual style
- futurismStudy of tomorrow's possibilities
- experimentalTesting new methods
pioneering · revolutionary · Debussy · Ravel · collaboration · primitivism · scandal · shock · synthesis · Gesamtkunstwerk
Nijinsky
Ballet's gravity defier
- St. PetersburgRussian Baltic port city
- PavlovaBallet icon, namesake dessert
- ProkofievTwentieth-century Russian composer
Firebird
Pontiac sports coupe line
- Rite of SpringModernist ballet about renewal
- ScheherazadeLegendary endless storyteller
Nijinsky
Ballet's gravity defier
- neoclassicalReviving ancient aesthetic principles
- expressiveShowing feelings outwardly
- dramaticStrikingly expressive or sudden
angular · gestural · pantomime · narrative · abstraction · plastique · ensemble work
- ballettutus, tutu, barre, arabesque, pirouette
- Russian MusicTchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich
- Soviet Artpropaganda posters, Soviet architecture, Soviet design, hammer and sickle, political posters