Petipa Notwithstanding

Credits & Notes

Marius Petipa (1819-1910) was a French ballet dancer and choreographer at the Maryinsky Theater in St. Petersburg; among his ballets, The Sleeping Beauty and La Bayadere attest to his clarity, elegance of design and innovative use of the ballet vocabulary. He is considered to be the progenitor of classicism in ballet, the forebear of Fokine and Balanchine. Notwithstanding attempts to explore and expand the nature of classicism, Petipa remains the consummate and bracing model of classical virtues.

Petipa Notwithstanding was made possible by the National Endowment for the Arts and The Rockefeller Foundation.