Mikhail Baryshnikov: The Different Types Of Ballet

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Dance has been around for thousands of years, and to many people it is a form of passion. Many of those people including Mikhail Baryshnikov thought of dance as an obligation to life, instead of it being a casual hobby. There are also many different types of companies that are associated with dance. American Ballet Theatre is a company that is founded to be one of the greatest dance companies to exist, and also greatly recognized around the world. Mikhail Baryshnikov was incorporated with them in 1978. He had danced with them for about four years before moving on to New York City Ballet, not too long after, in 1980, he became the artistic director in American Ballet Theater . Mikhail Baryshnikov is best known and recognized as an …show more content…

According to Jennifer Homans, she describes ballet as “ a kind of freedom, and a focus on the body, purely clearing your mind.” Ballet is also a form of communication, instead of speaking, the dancer uses their body movements to speak to the audience. The real question is, how different is ballet from then to now? Ballet first originated in the Italian renaissance, occurring around the fifteenth to sixteenth centuries. There are also many different types of ballet. One of the first being classical ballet, many of which originate from their country For example, French ballet, Italian ballet, or Russian ballet. Furthermore, George Balanchine created neoclassical ballet. It consist of contemporary ballet, and post-structural ballet. Another type of ballet is contemporary ballet, consisting of classical and modern dances. As for present day ballet, it still follows many of the rules, costumes that the dancers wear, and techniques. Back then, majority of the dances choreographers created contained plots and stories. As for today, many dancers dance to just music, meaning it does not have to have a story within every dance. It could be based off of expression, and movement instead. The audience has the decision to choose which types of dances they prefer to watch, it could a musical inside of a theatre or a dance recital. Speaking of techniques and positions, ballet still follows the five basic positions of movements in ballet. One of the many popular and known techniques of ballet is called the point technique consisting of five different positions. The ballet dancer weight is fully supported by the tips of their toes, while wearing a pointe shoe. Ballet costumes are also a important essential to a ballets everyday life style, practices, and routined dances. To begin with, they had just began shortening the skirts, and stopped wearing heels. Dancers began wearing skirts that were half away above

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