Early Life and Works of George Balanchine

After the chaos of the 1917 Revolution, the new Soviet Union saw a period of great creative energy in all the arts. A child of his times, the young ballet dancer George Balanchine began to experiment with new choreographic ideas and forms, transforming the art of dance. By expanding the vocabulary of classical ballet and altering movement dynamics, he set the direction that ballet was to take for the remainder of the 20th century. This study explores his earliest choreography and examines how he combined elements from the classical tradition of the Imperial Russian Ballet with the new movements in Constructivist sculpture and theater. He brought these innovations to Paris when Diaghilev hired him as choreographer for the Ballets Russes a few years later. There he polished his work through collaborations with musicians such as Stravinsky and visual artists such as Matisse. Early works Balanchine created in Russia are examined in context with his Ballets Russes ballets,to show how his transformation culminated in Apollo, his first Neo-classical work.