Madeleine Eastoe as the Sylph in - PDF document

Madeleine Eastoe as the Sylph in ÔLa SylphideÕ, 2004Photo: Justin SmithCourtesy: The Australian Ballet BROLGA December 2005 ballet dancer in a soft, gauzy dress, even in the twenty-first century. Earlyfigures hovering in mid-air, or floating in woods and other gentle landscapes. They La Sylphide , thaticonic ballet of the Romantic era first performed in Paris in 1832. The Sylphrepresents what Erik Aschengreen has called Ôthe beautiful dangerÕ. And overthe years her long, soft tutu with its bell-shaped skirt has become therepresentative ballet costume of the era.A few decades after the premiere of La Sylphide those of their Romantic counterparts. We see them in the studio, in the wings,ups. But they still wear a dress that is soft and gauzy, although it has become alittle shorter. It reaches just below the knee. It has layers of fabric pushing it outalso has a low cut, tight-fitting bodice with, occasionally, a short, frilled sleeve.And more often than not the costume is white, as indeed was the longer,1870s. We may never be sure of the exact moment when a soft, gauzy whitedress became the familiar costume of the ballet dancer, but we do know that in Pigmalion , a work shechoreographed and in which she took the role of a statue that comes to life anddances with the sculptor who created it. SallŽ caused a stir because of theoutrageous costume she wore, outrageous for the times that is. She shortened BROLGA December 2005 Soft, gauzy ballet dresses MICHELLE POTTER É bare slender shoulders, a tight fitting bodice and a long soft, bell shaped skirt became the ideal for theRomantic look. he French newspaper, e Mercure reported: She dared to appear, without panniers, without skirt, without foundation, The arrival in the West of the fabric called muslin, of which SallŽÕs revolutionary no doubt someone to wash them for her. Since ballet costuming at the time La Sylphide . Even into the twenty-firstcentury the notion that the so-called Romantic tutu was designed especially for La Sylphide continues to be perpetuated. Ivor Guest, however, suggests that thesylph costumes may never have been designed at all. No-one has been able tofind the design drawings for the sylphs from this ballet, although costumedesigns for the rest of the characters are in the archives of the Paris Opera. Guestand others speculate that instructions for making what was simply anunremarkable style of costume for the day may well have been just written on apiece of paper and then thrown out. We know too that this kind of costume was LaSylphide . In 1820, twelve years before La Sylphide teacher, Carlo Blasis, wrote in his technical manual: ÔThe dress worn by the pupils In fact, the long white Romantic dress thateventually became an iconic part of ballet costuming probably just evolved overmany years. BROLGA December 2005 Soft, gauzy ballet dresses But if the dresses for La Sylphide just evolved rather than being consciouslydesigned, the influence these costumes had on the future of ballet wasimmense. ÔThis new style brought an excess of white gauze, tulle and tarlatanÕ,wrote ThŽophile Gautier in La Presse in 1844. ÔWhite was just about the onlycolour used.Õ The widespread use of the long, white Romantic costume in theyears after La Sylphide gave the ballet world that the now familiar term ÔballetblancÕ or Ôwhite balletÕ. In the Romantic Ôballet blancÕ, of which the second acts of La Sylphide and Giselle Romantic period, showing the eraÕs interest in the ethereal and in the ideal offemale beauty. We can see a twentieth-century reincarnation of the form inGeorge BalanchineÕs Serenade The heyday of the soft, gauzy dress, however, was also a period when female The Era in 1877, signing herself with theanonymous ÔA ballet girlÕ, saying: our money. We have to do all this for nothing. We have to rehearse from do I recognise a manÕs right to dance in publicÕ. 10 The men in DegasÕ balletpaintings are musicians, teachers and admirers and those ethereal creatureshovering and darting through forests and glades in their long white tutus wereoften at the mercy of men off stage and certainly subjected to the male gazewhile on stage. Some female dancers accepted gifts and propositions from menas a way of escaping their poverty but, as Hatcher has remarked, those who didso Ôruined the reputations of the others for some time to comeÕ. 11 growth of the tutu as we know it today, was highly combustible. There are astage. The case of Emma Livry, rising young star of the Paris Opera, is perhaps BROLGA December 2005 disliked the heaviness the coating brought to her soft, gauzy dress. She had, infact, written to the management of the Paris Opera taking responsibility for anyaccident that might befall her as a result of her decision. 12 By the early twentieth century, visual records such as postcards and early, the skirt of the female dancerÕs costume was still bell-shaped but itsto lose something of its soft, gauzy quality. Nevertheless, as the skirt of theRomantic balletÕs most famous costume was progressively shortened, the term BROLGA December 2005 Soft, gauzy ballet dresses Unidentified dancer, scene from Marius PetipaÕs La Bayadre 18771877versions of Swan Lake Serge LifarÕs Suite en blanc 19431943Õs Symphony in C Harald LanderÕs Etudes 19481948elchÕs Velocity category. AuthorÕs note: This article is an adaptation of a program note, ÔWhite, women andthe world of balletÕ, written for the Australian BalletÕs 2005 season of White also inspired by Justin SmithÕs photographic study of Madeleine Eastoe as theartist to be reckoned with. SmithÕs portrait captures indeed that Ôbeautiful dangerÕ NOTES Patricia Linton ÔRomanticism in balletÕ in Dancing Times 2Erik Aschengreen, ÔThe beautiful danger: facets of the Romantic balletÕ, trans. Dance Perspectives 3Quoted in Madeleine Inglehearn, ÔSallŽ, MarieÕ in The International Dictionary of Ballet VDetroit: St James Press, 1993Detroit: St James Press, 19934Pauline Weston Thomas, Regency Fashion History 5Philippe Noisette, Couturiers de la danse 6Ivor Guest, ÔCostume and the nineteenth century dancerÕ, in Roy Strong et al., Designing for the Dancer 7Carlo Blasis, TraitŽ ŽlŽmentaire, thŽorique et pratique de lÕart de la danse ÔDancewear through the agesÕ, saksmovingwear.com, accessed 24 November 2005.8ThŽophile Gautier, ƒcrits sur la danse 9Quoted in Judith Hatcher, ÔVictorian ballet girls: trials, troubles and tribulations in a Dance Magazine 10Quoted in John V. Chapman, ÔJules Janin: Romantic criticÕ in Led.ed. Rethinking the Sylph: New Perspectives on the Romantic Ballet 11Hatcher, p. 86.12Ibid. BROLGA December 2005 11