Part 2: Russian Ballet History and the Perfect Ballet Body
“Today, seven to eight of my ballets are performed in the Kirov/Mariinsky Theater. This was my school, where I learned about ballet and the great Marius Petipa, who was Artistic Director of the Mariinsky for 60 years. I was Artistic Director for a little more than 20 years. I learned from Petipa’s ballets about the basic structure of classic ballets like Don Quixote, Giselle, and others. I based my ballets on this classical ballet structure. I followed a story, included dramatic conflicts, developed the characters…overall ‘life’ construction. One of the major important effects of Soviet ballet for the rest of the ballet world was the creation of these monumental full length ballets.