Meet The Artists
Biography
Serge Diaghilev
Ballets Russes / impresario / modernist experimentation
(1872-1929)
Serge Diaghilev was a Russian impresario and the founder of one of the most important dance companies of the 20th century. During the first decade of the 20th century, Diaghilev arranged for Russian artists to tour to Paris. Russian dance was so popular with Parisian audiences that Diaghilev created a permanent company, Les Ballets Russes.
Although he had no training in music composition, design or choreography, Diaghilev's genius lay in his ability to identify and nurture the creative talents of other people. He organized successful collaborations between highly innovative people and oversaw their efforts with his discerning taste.
Most of the choreographic works presented by Les Ballets Russes were modernist in style and experimented with new types of movements, themes, sets and décor. Examples of these ballets include L'Après-midi d'un Faune (1912), Parade (1917) and Les Biches (1924). Some Ballets Russes productions, such as Le Sacre du Printemps (1913), were so revolutionary that audiences rioted during their premieres.
Les Ballets Russes also had a significant impact on Parisian society. The set designs and costumes of the company's productions influenced trends in fashion, interior decoration and commercial art.
Anna Pavlova, Tamara Karsavina and Vaslav Nijinsky were among Les Ballets Russes' first principal dancers. The designer Leon Bakst, the painter Pablo Picasso and the composer Igor Stravinsky were also closely associated with the company. Five important 20th-century choreographers worked for Les Ballets Russes: Michel Fokine, Vaslav Nijinsky, L é onide Massine, Bronislava Nijinska and George Balanchine.
Many of the dance artists assembled by Diaghilev continued to perform, teach and choreograph after he died in 1929 and the company disbanded. This dissemination of talent was an important factor in the development of ballet worldwide during the 20th century.
Diaghilev protégées Marie Rambert and Ninette de Valois started ballet companies in England. Serge Lifar was appointed director of the Paris Opera Ballet. George Balanchine was invited to establish a ballet company in New York, which eventually became known as the New York City Ballet.
Learn more:
Garafola, Lynn. Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989. Lifar, Serge. Serge Diaghilev, His Life, His Work, His Legend: An Intimate Biography. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1940.
