...Introduction In my essay I am going to be discussing ‘Tragic Ballets ‘and ‘Heroines’. As a child I spent a brief period studying ballet and on a visit to Prague, in February 2013, I enjoyed watching the Russian Ballet perform 'Giselle' at the Prague State Opera House. I have often wondered why so many ballets and the female heroines in them end in tragedy. My essay will discuss the issues that female heroines face and the events that eventually bring them to their fate. I will also discuss the origins and definitions of ‘heroine’ and ‘tragedy’. In order to examine my chosen themes I started my investigation by watching, analysing and comparing the films ‘Black Swan’, ‘The Red Shoes’ and the ballet ‘Giselle’. I read the feminist writings of Marina Warner on the portrayal of women, the Catholic Church and also her book on ‘Joan of Arc. In my essay I will be discussing the themes of love, conquest, devotion, deception, spirituality and how they play a role in altering the lives of the female protagonists in various different situations and offer my own opinions on how the tragedies are formed. I will begin my comparison of the female heroines that I will be discussing, with Giselle. Figure 1'Giselle and Count Albrecht' The Russian Ballet Giselle is a poor peasant’s daughter who falls in love with Count Albrecht. Count Albrecht’s character plays the main part in the protagonist Giselle’s downfall during the ballet, as he breaks her heart when she learns that he is betrothed...
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...Consumer Reviews for the ‘Tory Burch Reva Ballet Flat’ ◦ Summary Analysis. To get a better understanding of how consumers view the Tory Burch Reva Flat, I went to Amazon.com marketplace and type in the Tory Burch Reva Ballet flat. I choose to look at Amazon reviews because I find them to be honest and you can generally tell when there is a paid review listed. So I gathered four of the most recent reviews and they display an array of opinions. In looking at the reviews, the three disadvantages listed are the size of the shoe, people are suggesting to get the shoe a half size or a full size up so that they will fit more comfortable as their were issues with the width of the shoe and the heel rubbing on the shoe as well as the toe box being too tight due to the logo ornanment on the toe. Another disadvantage of the shoe was the comfort of the shoe, once people purchased a comfortable style their were complaints about not being able to wear them all day long becauase of the flatness and lack of support of the shoe. Lastly the availablitly of various styles, people want a certain style of this shoe, weather it’s the simple classic black ballet flat or, the matta logo, or a certain color, people search for the certain style/color combination that they perfer in this shoe. The common advantages found amongst the consumers in these reviews are, the style, regardless of any discomfort or price, people are willing to wear and purchase this shoe at varioius price...
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...Bodies are Equal A simple Google image search of “ballet” and “ballerina” returns images of thin, white women standing on their toes. Then, with a quick scroll down, there is an image of Misty Copeland standing on her toes yet still surrounded by images of white women on their toes. The image of a ballerina is steeped in centuries long ideas about what it means to be beautiful and who is able to be worthy of being beautiful. Due to this historical inequality and unequal opportunities, black dancers have been prevented from pursuing training and performance opportunities in dance. Institutionalized racism exists in the dance world due to a Eurocentric standard of beauty and dance which gives unequal attention and advantage to dancers based on their race. To start with, there is a Eurocentric ideal of beauty in the dance world that prohibits black dancers from accessing the same opportunities as their white counterparts. In her Op-Ed, Theresa Ruth Howard summarizes the image of the ballerina by writing that “The ‘ballerina’ represents the unattainable ideal of woman: the chaste, fragile beauty,...
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...On the contrary, for decades, white women are presented as pure, virtuous, and civilized in the media and film (Lecture). Therefore, the idea of “White women hood” comes into picture. They have to be civilized in order to create discourse of uncivilized colonies.“True Women” – which were limited to white, mainly upper class women – were expected to uphold the four virtues of piety, purity, submission, and domesticity. These “virtues” were directly tied to white women’s sexuality and ability to reproduce. These myths of “pure” white womanhood are obviously extremely harmful for white women. It creates a misogynistic where white women have very little agency, particularly sexually. One example of this type of distinction between a white woman...
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...Tarrant County College Northwest Campus Serenade, L & Gloria Jenny Arbelaez Student ID 1070110 Danc 1341-32156; Ballet I Ms. Amy Sleigh 03/08/2014 Serenade, L & Gloria Review Visiting the Texas Ballet Theater for first time is definitely an incredible experience. When you cross the main entrance someone is waiting for you to guide you where to go and where to sit. I was so lucky that the theater upgraded my seat so I was able to be just in front of the stage in row 6. Next to me was a middle aged couple both wearing black and so excited that they were celebrating their anniversary. In front of my seat were two young ladies and in the back a mother with her little daughter who was constantly asking her mom when the show will begin. At 8:00 o’clock the lights start dimming and all the assistants begin to situate to their designated place and everybody in the audience turned off their cellphones and are preparing to enjoy the show. The performance opens with slow music and a dim blue light. Sixteen women appear on the stage with a baby blue skirt and all of them with a perfect tight hair updos. They dance like they were fairies flying in the middle of the night. The most remarkable movements were the petit batterment, adagio, grand and arabesques. The dance was pure, innocent, and elegant; the movements were so precise and clean that the dancers look like little angels in the middle of the stage. After forty minutes of an exceptional show the curtain...
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...performer's body and soul. It has started wars, and it has brought peace. Dance has changed the world. Two of these styles are Ballet and Jazz, and they have been apart of society and life for many years. When one thinks of beauty and grace in dance, they cannot help but to think of Ballet. In the 15th century, Ballet was first developed in the Italian Renaissance courts. Celebrations like weddings and extravagant parties called for dancing to be an elaborate spectacle. At these events, dancing instructors taught Noblemen and women how to make these events truly memorable by having them participate in the performances. This was the meager beginning of Ballet until Catherine de Medici began to fund ballet in the French court in the 16th century. Catherine de Medici was the wife of King Henry II of France and a great patron of the arts. Catherine would throw elaborate festivals called ballet de cour. Ballet de cour included dance, decor, costume, song, music and poetry. It was a culmination of all the arts to push the advancement of the style of ballet until King Louis XIV helped to popularize and standardize the art form a century later. King Louis XIV was a passionate dancer, and his love of ballet fostered its elevation from a pastime for amateurs to an endeavor requiring professional training. There have been many other people that have pushed ballet forward, but this is the main start of...
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...Danceable Fashion or Fashionable Dance: Either way, it works! A Concept Paper Presented to Prof. Robert Rodriguez Division of Humanities, College of Arts and Sciences University of the Philippines in the Visayas, Miagao, Iloilo In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Course in Communications 2 By Nohr Malynne Tabares February 5, 2013 There’s an exciting fashion trend happening – dance. The dance and fashion industries seem to be increasingly joining forces, with dance companies commissioning high profile designers and fashion labels turning to dancers to optimally show off their clothes. The collision of the worlds of fashion and dance creates alchemy beyond the reach of either one alone. Fashion is made to move in the world, and dance is extreme motion. The interaction between dance and fashion inspires new ideas for stories and forms of expression, and brings new audiences to both art forms. This season, as the fashion industry becomes more competitive, a string of in-demand models with serious dance backgrounds literally have a leg up. At the same time, as the pages of this fall’s set of weighty magazines attest, professional dancers are influencing fashion in ways never seen before. The pathway to becoming a dancer may vary, but most people start by taking classes at a local dance school. If the goal is to become a professional dancer, this is followed by auditioning for an organization that specializes in full-time dance training, completing...
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...“Black Swan” - “Yellow Wallpaper” Why can one only lose their self entirely or free oneself by creating an alternate reality in their own mind? If we compare the “Black Swan to the “Yellow Wallpaper,” maybe then we can begin to answer this question. “In the film 'Black Swan', Nina, always a white swan, begins to explore her Shadow (her black swan) for her lead role in 'Swan Lake'. I'm struck by the factors and presences pushing and pulling Nina into and out of her Shadow: namely, her creepy, infantilizing mother and her abusive, seducing director.” (Tally) Nina doesn't get to explore her notorious dark side in any remotely safe or healthy ways. Her mother has trapped her inside a pink, endless childhood--her bedroom full of stuffed animals, her mother physically dressing and undressing her, with Nina calling her 'mommy' in a needy, babyish voice which is the only thing, it seems, that will talk her mother back from the extreme edge of her bouts of rage.” (Tally) “Nor can Nina explore her Shadow in the world of the ballet--dominated by the forceful and dangerous director and a cut-throat group of ballerinas, many of whom seem to share Nina's eating disorder and her willingness to do anything to be on top in the company.” (Tally) “So from the beginning, is there any chance for Nina? At the end of the ballet, the swan queen can only find freedom in death: a fate that Nina shares.” (Tally) When Nina crosses over to...
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...to flowers such as lilies most commonly, and her father and brother strongly condemn the innocence that comes with her character. In The Black Swan, everything Nina wears and does is closely related to innocence....
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...At the time of her career, major movements included Abstract Expressionism (emphasized an artist's liberty to convey attitudes and emotions through nontraditional and usually non-representational means, merriam-webster.com), The Black Power Movement, 1968-1980, and some of the countries she visited, Senegal, for example, gained their independence in the 1960s. Her work influenced dancers such as Donald McKayle and Alvin Ailey(American choreographer and activist who founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater), who continued to go deeper into the expressive dances of black culture. Dunham had a major impact on 20th/21st century society and culture because of her new dance techniques that incorporated tradition and...
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...parent, hygiene, and household cleanliness. Basically, these directions are administered in effects to win over the young lady. Certainly, Diaz is not afraid to assert trivial signs that disclose ethnic insolences, even if they diminish Dominican ethnicity. Certainly, there is a power relationship of race in “How to Date a Browngirl, Blackgirl, Whitegirl, or Halfie”. Color is an immense portion of this story, and a great share of how he treats each category of lassie. Diaz describes how to interpret and react to each situation, based upon the race of the girl whom you are on a date with. He involuntarily gives different ethnicities different characteristics and expectations. For example, it seems as if the author tends to illustrate white women as rather slutty. He says, “If...
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...because it’s been around for so long. The Coca-Cola ad featuring Marc Jacob’s clothing is more up to date and it is selling fashion and how slim you can be when drinking Diet Coke. The background is all white and the ad is a can of Diet Coke with a man and woman and at the bottom it’s a red heart with the name Marc Jacobs next to it, who is a fashion designer. The can of coke is gray with red dots and has a skinny woman on the can itself. Her body is turned half way while she is looking towards the man. She has on yellow and white leggings that are stripped horizontally with black and white star panties over it. Her shoes are blue and brown high heels with her shirt being horizontally stripped long sleeve black and white. It looks as if the shirt has a red collar and a red heart at the top right corner. The woman has no face expression. The words Diet Coke is written side-ways on the can, diet is written in black and coke is written in red and above it, it says Marc Jacobs. On top of the can sits a skinny woman leaning back a little and she is smiling. The...
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...Garret Hogan IDT I African Dance 20 November 2012 My Background Memories of pain and sorrow often times come to mind in my family when asked about our heritage. Being of Russian decent, the women in my family were not treated with the respect that people would think. In fact, it was quite common for families to disown infant girls because they were only interested on raising men to carry on the family name. Having a daughter only meant that they would have to give up what they owned someday in a dowry to another family. Such was the case with my great-grandmother, Betty Veska. Betty is not her real first name. As a child when she learned of the situation she was in, being abandoned, she decided from then on she would continue on with a different name. So Betty Veska was reborn. Unfortunately I could not get her to tell me her original birth given name, perhaps she did not even have one, or maybe no one except herself and the orphanage in which she grew up knows. At any rate the stories she shared of the orphanage and her time out of it were truly remarkable. Growing up in an orphanage can be tough to begin with. Growing up in an orphanage in the heart of an area of what is now known as Bulgaria during the Great Depression was even worse. Many believe that the Great Depression was only affecting the United States. This was false. Though it may be true the Depression affected the U.S more than any other country that is not to say other countries were not hit hard...
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...could only exert pressure on oneself, thus threatening one’s emotional well-being. Sometimes it’s okay to acknowledge and even yield to our desires and temptations provided no harm could be done to others and society in which we are living in. Through the course of Lina’s revelation of her dark side, the relationship between Lina and her mother undergoes a sea change. She is initially obedient and respectful to her mother, seeing her as a role model in the pursuit of the top of her career. But as her dark side begins to reveal, she gradually comes to the realization of her mother’s creepy possessiveness and begins to defy his mother. Their conflict is at its greatest when Lina discovers her mom’s attempt to stop her from playing the black swan and that’s when she verbally attacks even physically injures her mom. Personally, I think her mother’s over-protectiveness stems from the early setbacks in her career. She...
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...roles. While Fred Astaire can be seen playing a supposed playboy and a famous dancing performer and a brother to a princess to be. Also sometimes men were more successful than women and made all the money for their cloths and food. On the contrary, the careers are different for females than males. For example, Rita Hayworth can be seen playing a Femme Fatale in Gilda, The romantic version of Salome, and a gypsy. On the other hand, Ann miller could be seen playing an ex-dancing partner of Fred Astaire, Bianca in Kiss me Kate and a female professor in On The Town. Also women were often able to have only minor careers and able afford things because the men especially if they were actors were kings of the hills. Secondly, the styles of male dancers are different from the female dancers. For instance, Gene Kelly could be seen wearing a variety of athletic suits and cloths. While Fred Astaire could be seen wearing tuxedos and top hats and tails. Furthermore, female dancers styles are different then the males styles. For instance, Rita Hayworth often wore gowns made of gold lame and black satin. While, Ann Miller wore fashionable dresses to emphasize her body's curves and to show off her long dancing legs. Finally, male dancers differ in talent from female dancers. For instance, Gene Kelly did flips and ballet and...
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