Russian dancer and choreographer, founder of men's dance of the 20th century, Vaslav Fomich Nijinsky was born on March 12 (February 28, old style) 1889 (according to other sources, 1888 or 1890) in Kyiv in the family of Polish provincial dancers Eleonora Bereda and Foma Nijinsky. His parents owned their own ballet troupe, which toured in various cities. All three Nijinsky children were gifted musically and plastically, had good external characteristics and early age were dancing.
In 1907, Vaclav graduated from the St. Petersburg Theater School (now the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet). His teachers were famous choreographers and dancers of that time Nikolai and Sergei Legat, Mikhail Obukhov.
Since 1907, Nijinsky performed in the main roles in ballets Mariinsky Theater. Among his partners were the famous prima ballerinas Matilda Kshesinskaya, Anna Pavlova and Tamara Karsavina.
In 1908, Nijinsky met the Russian entrepreneur Sergei Diaghilev, who invited him as a leading dancer to participate in the first “Russian Ballet Season” in Paris in 1909. The dancer's performance was a great success among the Parisian public. In 1909-1913, Nijinsky was the leading soloist of the Russian Seasons.
Nijinsky's talent manifested itself in such performances staged by choreographer Mikhail Fokine as "Armida's Pavilion" to the music of Nikolai Tcherepnin, "Cleopatra" to the music of Anton Arensky and the divertissement "The Feast". His performance of the pas de deux from “The Sleeping Beauty” by Pyotr Tchaikovsky was a huge success. In 1910, he shone in Adolphe Adam's "Giselle" and Fokine's ballets "Carnival" and "Scheherazade" to the music of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.
Fokine choreographed for the dancer the parts of the young poet in “Chopinian” to the music of Frederic Chopin, main party in "The Vision of a Rose" to the music of Carl Weber, Petrushka in the ballet of the same name by Igor Stravinsky and Narcissus in the ballet of the same name to the music of Nikolai Tcherepnin, as well as the role of Daphnis in "Daphnis and Chloe" to the music of Maurice Ravel.
In 1911, Nijinsky was fired from the Mariinsky Theater as a result of the scandal. The occasion was his appearance on stage in a too revealing costume in the play “Giselle”, which was visited by the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna. From that time on, the dancer became a permanent member of Diaghilev's troupe.
Nijinsky, encouraged by Diaghilev, also tried his hand as a choreographer. His first job" Afternoon rest Faun" to the music of Claude Debussy (1912) amazed the audience, which was not accustomed to choreography based on profile poses and angular movements. Nijinsky's next productions were characterized by anti-romanticism and opposition to the usual grace of the classical style.
In 1913, Vaslav Nijinsky staged Debussy's "Games", at the same time his most significant work— “The Rite of Spring” by Igor Stravinsky.
In 1913, while on tour in South America, Nijinsky married the Hungarian dancer Romola Pulski. This led to a breakdown in relations between the dancer and Diaghilev, as a result of which Nijinsky was forced to leave the troupe.
He rejected the offer to head the Grand Opera ballet in Paris, deciding to create his own enterprise. He managed to assemble a troupe of 17 people (it included the dancer’s sister Bronislava and her husband, who also left Diaghilev) and signed a contract with the London Palace Theater. The repertoire consisted of productions by Nijinsky and, in part, by Fokine (The Specter of the Rose, Carnival, La Sylphides, which Nijinsky remade again). However, the tour was not successful and ended in financial ruin, which led to a nervous breakdown and the onset of mental illness for the artist.
In 1914 the first world war found the couple returning to St. Petersburg with their newborn daughter in Budapest, where they were interned until the beginning of 1916.
In April 1916, Nijinsky danced his signature roles in “Petrushka” and “The Vision of a Rose” on the stage of the New York Metropolitan Opera in a renewed contract with Diaghilev for the Russian Ballet tour in North and South America.
On October 23, 1916, the premiere of Nijinsky's last ballet Till Eulenspiegel by Richard Strauss was shown at the Manhattan Opera in New York, in which he performed the leading role. The performance, which was created in a hurry, despite a number of interesting discoveries, failed.
In 1917, Nijinsky finally left the stage and settled in Switzerland with his family. Here in 1918 he began to keep his diary entries.
On January 19, 1919, at the Suvretta House Hotel in Saint Moritz, Nijinsky danced for the last time for the public.
Suffering from an incurable mental illness, Nijinsky spent 30 years in hospitals and sanatoriums.
On April 8 (according to other sources, April 11), 1950, Vaslav Nijinsky died in London. In 1953, his body was transported to Paris and buried in the Sacre Coeur cemetery next to the graves of the legendary dancer Gaetan Vestris and playwright Théophile Gautier, one of the creators of the romantic ballet.
Married to Romola Pulski, the dancer had daughters Kira and Tamara.
Nijinsky's sister, ballerina and choreographer Bronislava Nijinska, staged ballets in Diaghilev's troupe in the 1920s, the most famous of which was Les Noces to the music of Stravinsky.
The dancer's recordings were first published in an abridged version under the title "The Diary of Vaslav Nijinsky" in 1936 in London. English translation. In 1953, the Parisian publishing house Gallimard published The Diary of Vaslav Nijinsky, translated from English language into French. In 1978, Nijinsky's daughters agreed to a complete translation of their father's notes, which was published in France.
In 1971, the famous French choreographer Maurice Bejart staged the ballet "Nijinsky, God's Clown" to the music of Pierre Henri and Pyotr Tchaikovsky.
The dancer was also the subject of the film “Nijinsky” (1980) directed by Herbert Ross. Among the numerous performances dedicated to Nijinsky in Russia is “Nijinsky, God’s Crazy Clown,” staged by Andrei Zhitinkin in 1999 at the Moscow drama theater on Malaya Bronnaya.
The material was prepared based on information from open sources
Nijinsky Vaslav Fomich (1889-1950), an outstanding Russian dancer and choreographer.
Born on February 28 (March 12), 1889 in Kyiv in the family famous dancers Thomas (Tomas) Lavrentievich Nijinsky and Eleonora Nikolaevna Bereda, who owned their own ballet troupe. The troupe toured different cities: in Paris, St. Petersburg, Kyiv, Minsk, Tiflis, Odessa.
I'm God's clown
Nijinsky Vaslav Fomich
All three Nijinsky children were gifted musically and plastically, had good external characteristics and were involved in dance from an early age. They received their first choreography lessons from their mother. My father also tried his hand as a choreographer. For six-year-old Vaclav, his older brother, and younger sister Bronislava, a famous future ballerina and choreographer, he composed a pas de trois - this was the first “performance” of the future genius. After the divorce, the mother settled in St. Petersburg with her three children.
In 1900-1908 he studied at the St. Petersburg Theater School, where he studied under the guidance of N.G. Legat, M.K. Obukhov and E. Cecchetti. Once on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater, he quickly became a soloist. He belonged to a galaxy of young dancers who shared the innovative ideas of M. M. Fokin. He danced in Fokine's ballets The White Slave (N.N. Cherepnin's Armida Pavilion, 1907), The Youth (Chopiniana, 1908), The Ebony Slave (Egyptian Nights by A.S. Arensky, 1907), Albert (Giselle Adana, 1910).
Almost immediately after graduating from college, Nijinsky was invited by S.P. Diaghilev to participate in the 1909 ballet season, where he gained enormous success. For his ability to jump high and elevate for a long time, he was called the bird-man, the second Vestris. Nijinsky became Diaghilev's discovery, the first dancer, and then the choreographer of the troupe (1909-1913, 1916).
In Paris, the dance repertoire tested on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater was performed (Pavilion Armida, 1907; Chopinian or La Sylphide, 1907; Egyptian Nights or Cleopatra 1909; Giselle, 1910; Swan Lake, 1911), as well as the divertissement Feast to the music of Russian composers, 1909; and roles in Fokine's new ballets Schumann's Carnival, 1910; Scheherazade by N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov, 1910; Orientals A. Glazunov, 1910; Vision of a Rose by K. M. Weber, 1911, in which he amazed the Parisian public with a fantastic jump through a window; Parsley by I.F. Stravinsky, 1911; Blue God R. Ghana, 1912; Daphnis and Chloe M. Ravel, 1912.
Encouraged by Diaghilev, Nijinsky tried his hand as a choreographer and, secretly from Fokine, rehearsed his first ballet - The Afternoon of a Faun to the music of C. Debussy (1912). He based his choreography on profile poses borrowed from ancient Greek vase painting. Like Diaghilev, Nijinsky was fascinated by the rhythmoplastics and eurythmics of Dalcroze, in whose aesthetics he staged his next and most significant ballet, The Rite of Spring, in 1913. The Rite of Spring, written by Stravinsky in an atonal system and choreographically built on complex combinations of rhythms, became one of the first expressionist ballets. The ballet was not immediately accepted, and its premiere ended in scandal, as did Afternoon of a Faun, which shocked the audience with its finale. erotic scene. In the same year he performed the plotless ballet Plays by Debussy. These productions by Nijinsky were characterized by anti-romanticism and opposition to the usual grace of the classical style.
The Parisian public was captivated by the artist's undoubted dramatic talent and his exotic appearance. Nijinsky turned out to be a brave and original-minded choreographer, who opened new paths in plastic arts and returned male dance former priority and virtuosity. Nijinsky also owed his successes to Diaghilev, who believed and supported him in daring experiments. The break with Diaghilev due to Nijinsky's marriage to the unprofessional dancer Romola Pulskaya led to Nijinsky's departure from the troupe and, in fact, to the end of his short, dizzying career.
For twenty-nine years of his life, Vaslav Nijinsky belonged to this world. It included a road from Mokhovaya to Teatralnaya to the Imperial Theater School. The granite descent to the Neva, on the steps of which he cried when he was fired from the Mariinsky Theater. Paris, London and Nice, where he danced in Diaghilev's seasons. Diaghilev himself, who took away his love and freedom, but led him to worldwide fame. Three productions that marked the beginning of twentieth-century ballet.
Then there were thirty years of living in our own world of dreams and fantasies, about which we know almost nothing. Because every schizophrenic has his own.
His most hard-won role, perhaps, was Petrushka in Stravinsky’s ballet. The Tragedy of the Rag Doll human soul I truly experienced only the 20th century. People gradually gained freedom, freeing themselves from the shackles of illusory and real world, where their parents still lived. But this liberation brought terrible loneliness, because the person was now responsible for his own life.
The theme of carnival, theater, booth, fair was in demand in artistic life Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century. Dolls suffering like people. People turning into dolls. Both of them are wearing masks.
In 1905, Alexander Blok wrote the poem "Balaganchik".
“Here is a booth opened for cheerful and nice children. A girl and a boy are watching
For ladies, kings and devils."
How nice it all started, what a good fairy tale could have come from this life.
In 1890, the premiere of The Sleeping Beauty was triumphantly held on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater. It was a landmark production. For many contemporaries, the reign Alexandra III associated with the golden age of the Russian Empire.
"The Sleeping Beauty" was, perhaps, the last farewell to the era of classicism in ballet. The solemn music of Tchaikovsky and the pompous scenery of Levot and his comrades, the exquisite production of Petipa, combining the best of the French, Italian and Russian schools of ballet.
But all this is in the Imperial Theater. Behind its walls, neither 32, nor even 64 fouettés, “twisted” by a ballet soloist, could help the matter. Behind the walls there was a completely different life, which the ballet theater had to see and accept.
This became possible in 1903, when Petipa resigned as chief choreographer of the Mariinsky Theater. He devoted more than half a century to the theater. But by the beginning of the twentieth century, ballet remained, perhaps, the only art form that had no relation to real life. It was a dried flower or a butterfly on a pin in the collection of an eccentric who, in the age of electricity and the automobile, wears a camisole and a powdered wig; with the passing of Petipa, ballet began to catch up with its time by ten-mile strides.
At first, Nikolai Gorsky and Nikolai Legat tried to do this. Then a young dancer and choreographer Mikhail Fokin appeared. It seems that he was the one who woke up the ballet Beauty. Everything was ready for production new play called "Russian Seasons" in Paris. The gentlemen actors gathered for rehearsal. The year was 1907.
Characters and performers
Mikhail Mikhailovich Fokin, 27 years old, dancer at the Mariinsky Theater, teacher at the Theater School, choreographer.
In 1906-1907 Fokine created The Vine, Eunice, Chopiniana, Egyptian Nights, The Swan (better known as The Dying Man) and The Pavilion of Armida. Thus, the ballet theater entered the era of eclecticism, when heroes and plots of all times and peoples appeared on the stage. Artists became like-minded people of Fokine Alexander Benois and Lev Bakst, ballerinas Anna Pavlova and Tamara Karsavina, dancer Vaslav Nijinsky.
Sergei Pavlovich Diaghilev, 35 years old, gentleman, philanthropist, discoverer of talent, author of daring projects and in this sense - a fighter, a player.
In 1898, the first art magazine in Russia, “World of Art,” began publishing. In 1905 he organized a grandiose historical and artistic exhibition of portraits of the 18th-19th centuries. Then he organized an exhibition at the Autumn Salon in Paris " Russian art from icon painting to the beginning of the twentieth century." Concerts of Russian music soon followed, introducing Europe to Glinka, Mussorgsky, Borodin, Rachmaninov, Rimsky-Korsakov. Another year later - the opera season. Paris heard Fyodor Chaliapin. At the same time, the idea of stage synthesis in ballet - the unification of the forces of dancers, musicians, choreographers and artists, what was later called the “Diaghilev seasons” arose.
Tamara Platonovna Karsavina, 22 years old, is not yet at the rank of ballerina at the Imperial Theaters, although she already dances ballerina roles.
Talented, beautiful and smart. An ideal model for Fokine's historical productions. It was at this time that the passionately in love Fokin receives a refusal from her, and Karsavina remains a ghostly dream for him.
Vaslav Fomich Nijinsky, 17 years old. I just graduated from the Theater School and was accepted into the Mariinsky Theater troupe.
In life, he is a clumsy and ugly young man with a vacant look and often with a half-open mouth. On stage - a graceful handsome man with radiant eyes, striking with the precision of his jumps and poses, “elevation and balloon,” as they wrote in the reviews. A Pinocchio doll that becomes human at the first sounds of the overture.
"And this hellish music sounds, The sad bow howls. The terrible devil grabbed the little one, And the cranberry juice flows down."
Eternal slave
In his first season at the Mariinsky, Nijinsky danced in almost all ballets. Both classic and new ones staged by Fokin. He was a partner of Matilda Kshesinskaya, Anna Pavlova, Olga Preobrazhenskaya. He was a romantic youth in Chopinian, a slave of Cleopatra in Egyptian Nights, and a page of the sorceress Armida in Armida's Pavilion.
Somehow, quite naturally, the role of slave and page passed after him into real life. At first, a representative of the “other Petersburg” - Prince Pavel Dmitrievich Lvov - became his master and lover. In Nijinsky's life, reckless drivers, fur coats, night restaurants, and expensive gifts appeared. And the feeling of being used and then abandoned by Parsley that remained forever.
Then there was Diaghilev, who saved him from the clutches of cynical bohemia, surrounded him with care and attention, but at the same time fenced him off from life glass walls. Because Diaghilev always knew better what Nijinsky wanted.
Then there was Romola’s wife, who also knew everything better and by 1918 quite successfully “saved” her husband from the heartless world, driving him into a nightmare of madness.
But not one of them could boast that they knew the person who was nearby - Vaslav Nijinsky. Because Nijinsky became himself only in dance, and there he was alone, even if he passionately hugged his partner at that moment.
This is probably why he could dance so incredibly because he did not waste himself in everyday life, but only smiled and bowed by rote, answering sumptuous compliments in monosyllables. In some ways, both Diaghilev and Romola were right in believing that Vaclav was unable to take care of himself. Until now, they only cared about him.
He was born in 1889 into a family of dancers who traveled around Russia with a troupe of traveling actors. Bronislava was a year younger, Stanislav was a little older. While still a child, my older brother suffered a head injury, as a result of which he developed a mental illness. The family also remembered the father’s terrible outbursts of rage. So it is quite possible that Vaclav’s schizophrenia was hereditary.
The father started another family, and the mother decided to send Vaclav and Bronislava to the St. Petersburg Ballet School for government support. They took him only because he jumped beautifully, otherwise the data was unimportant.
From the very beginning of their training, ballet dancers were involved in performances. They were little devils, and tin soldiers, and pastoral shepherdesses. Once in the dance of the "fauns" they had to run and jump. When everyone had already landed, it turned out that one was still flying. The choreographer (and it was Fokine) staged a solo part for the jumping baby (Nijinsky). This was their first meeting.
At the school, Nijinsky was teased as a “Japanese” for his slanted eyes, harassed for his unsociability, but they did not offend him much. The teachers immediately made it clear who the main talent was. In high school, he read a lot, but for himself. Those around him remained in the dark about his mental abilities. It was the same with music lessons. He played music alone in an empty classroom, showing impenetrable stupidity in class. His favorite novel was The Idiot. Then Vaclav himself will be treated in Saint-Moritz, like Prince Myshkin.
Giselle Mania
The first season of the Russian Ballet in 1909 in Paris opened shortly after the end of the season at the Mariinsky. The performances were an unprecedented success. Everyone was shocked" Polovtsian dances"with the main archer - Fokine, "Cleopatra" with the monstrously seductive Ida Rubinstein, "La Sylphides" ("Chopiniana") with the airy Anna Pavlova and "Pavilion Armida", which revealed Nijinsky to the world. Fokine's ballet reform also consisted in the fact that he revived male dance. Before it, dances were staged exclusively for ballerinas, and partners were needed only to support them at the right moment, to help them show their talent, beauty, grace. Dancers began to be called “crutches.”
Fokin was not going to put up with this. Firstly, he himself wanted to dance, and the role of a “crutch” did not suit him at all. Secondly, he felt what ballet had lost by practically removing the dancer from the stage. The ballet has become cloying and fruity, completely sexless. It was possible to show the characters only by contrasting the female dance with an equal male dance. In this sense, Nijinsky was ideal material for Fokine. From his body, superbly trained at the Theater School, any shape could be molded. He could dance whatever the choreographer had in mind. And at the same time, with his own talent, spiritualize his every movement.
The old ballet was largely based on pantomime. This is how it was possible to convey, for example, a message about Scheherazade’s betrayal in sign language. “Listen (extend your hand to the Shah), just imagine (tap your forehead) that your queen (point to her and draw a crown above her head) made love (hug yourself with both arms) with a black man (make a fierce grimace and hold your hand in front of face down, depicting blackness)".
In Fokine’s ballet, the ruler of Persia, with his hand on the hilt of his sword, slowly approached his defeated opponent and turned the Negro’s body face up with his foot. And before that, they grappled in a deadly dance, and Nijinsky - the “Golden Negro” - expressed in this dance all the torment of love and despair.
Yes, he was a slave again and involuntarily began to think about the extent of responsibility that a person bears when making another his toy. These thoughts resulted in a new interpretation of the role of Albert in the ballet Giselle.
Previously, handsome Albert seduced a young peasant girl, “torn” her heart, but was generously forgiven. Nijinsky's Albert was not looking for pleasure, but for beauty. He did not want Giselle to die and did not imagine how everything would turn out. Albert was just able to discern the Other in the girl - a different, but kindred soul. That is why he is in such despair, that is why he is ready to punish himself and follow the Wilis (the creation of his mind) into the swamp of madness.
The interpretation was fully consistent with the spirit of the era, captured in Blok’s poems or in the image of the “witch’s lake” from Chekhov’s “The Seagull.” But it did not correspond to the spirit of the routine of the Imperial Mariinsky Theater. Therefore, having arrived in St. Petersburg after the Paris season of 1910 and danced “Giselle,” Nijinsky was fired from the theater for performing in an inappropriate costume. The costume, made according to Benoit's sketch, was considered inappropriate: tights and tights without fluffy pants, an integral part of the Alberts on the Russian stage of recent decades. Now Nijinsky fell into serfdom from Diaghilev, Yuryev's day of return to the imperial stage was taken away from him.
“He will be saved from black wrath with a wave of a white hand. Look: the lights are approaching from the left... Do you see the torches? Do you see the smoke? This is probably the queen herself...”
Blue God
There were many rumors about why Nijinsky was fired. One of them connected the dismissal with the intrigues of Diaghilev himself, who thus acquired a permanent artist. One way or another, now Vaclav belonged only to him. (Diaghilev once said to Karsavina: “Why didn’t you marry Fokin? Then you both would have belonged to me”).
It was possible to start a permanent troupe with the only star- Nijinsky. Everything had to work for him: Karsavina (still not breaking up with the Mariinsky), invited “stars” (negotiations with Pavlova and Kshesinskaya), a couple of character dancers, the art of Bakst and Benois, music of famous composers.
The first performance in 1911 again shocked the Parisian public. It was "The Phantom of the Rose" to the music of Carl von Weber's "Invitation to the Dance." It is based on a line from Théophile Gautier: “I am the ghost of the rose that you wore at the ball yesterday.”
Nijinsky had to dance not a person or even a flower, but the scent of a rose, which reminds a sleeping girl of yesterday's ball. Jean Cocteau, a regular at the Seasons, exclaimed that from now on he would associate the scent of roses with the last leap of Nijinsky, disappearing through the window. Probably, it was this ballet (not even a ballet, but an expanded pas de deux by Karsavina and Nijinsky) that allowed critics to correlate what they saw on stage with impressionism in painting.
The 1911 season could be called the most successful and fruitful. Fokine reached the peak of his activity as a choreographer. In addition to "The Specter of the Rose", the program included "Sadko" by Rimsky-Korsakov, "Narcissus" by Nikolai Tcherepnin, "Peri" by Paul Dukas and "Petrushka" by Igor Stravinsky. Ballets, as always, "from different lives": antiquity, East, Russian exoticism.
Somehow everything came together in “Petrushka”: both time and people. 20th century with its main theme freedom and unfreedom. "Eternal femininity" (Ballerina Karsavina), stupid masculinity (Arap Orlova), thirst for power (Magician Cecchetti) and " little man"(Nijinsky's Petrushka) made their choice. The fair dancer, in Stravinsky's words, "suddenly broke loose from the chain," allowed us to look into his soul. The soul of a doll that had become a man, in which there was so much pain, anger and despair.
The audience followed the doll's tragedy with fascination, but no one compared it with the tragedy of Nijinsky himself. After the performance, he ran away from the praise to the dressing room and removed layer after layer of makeup from his face, looking past the mirror. But the “Magician” Diaghilev came. He said that it was necessary to unwind, and took Nijinsky to dinner in the Bois de Boulogne. Parsley turned into a doll again.
Soon we began rehearsals for The Blue God, this time from Indian life. Almost all countries have already been covered by “plots”; soon they will have to repeat themselves.
A young lady named Romola Pulska was present at all the performances of the Seasons.
"Oh, no, why are you teasing me? This is a hellish retinue... The queen walks among broad daylight, Entwined with garlands of roses..."
Taming a wild beast
In 1912, Diaghilev said that Vaclav should try himself as a choreographer. He suggested thinking about symphonic prelude Debussy "Afternoon of a Faun". Fokin will not be able to deliver this. He will again organize bacchanalian dances. Moreover, for greater persuasiveness, he will demand to bring a flock of sheep.
Nijinsky asked that Debussy be played for him. And then he turned his head in profile and turned his hand with his palm facing outward. The man disappeared, a beast appeared, which itself became music. I wonder if Diaghilev realized that he was giving Nijinsky to the slaughter? There had never been such ballets before; they were ahead of their time, especially in Paris, which had not yet had time to enjoy the exoticism of the Russian Seasons.
The dance lasted only 12 minutes and showed a completely different aesthetic of ballet theater. Where you can move in two-dimensional space. Where you can forget about eversion of your feet and step from heel to toe. Where you can move not in unison with the music, but in pauses. After all, the main thing is not this, but the afternoon heat, to which both the young faun and the nymphs, as if descended from the frieze of the temple, submit. And the veil lost by the nymph, and the vague desire directed by the faun to this fetish.
The ballet was booed, after which it was shown a second time. They booed even more. But there were also those who welcomed the appearance of the “newest” ballet. Among them is Auguste Rodin, who fiercely defended Nijinsky.
The next premiere of the 1912 season was Fokine's Daphnis and Chloe. The innocent shepherd rejected the claims of his unloved one and united with his chosen one in the apotheosis of the ancient dance. A herd of sheep walked across the stage.
This was the end of the Fokin era, which lasted so short. Ballet was catching up with its time by leaps and bounds.
Then “Games” appeared, staged by Nijinsky in the style of Gauguin, whom he loved very much. The ballet was about contemporary young people playing tennis, but as free as the islanders of Tahiti.
Then, in the 1913 season, it was Nijinsky’s turn to perform “The Rite of Spring” with music by Stravinsky and scenery by Nicholas Roerich. burst into the hall pagan holiday spring spells. Dances are divination, a prayer for the awakening of the forces of nature, a sacrifice of the Chosen One. The hall could not stand this energy. The power of archetypes turned out to be too heavy for spectators who were not ready to participate in the ritual. The ballet was interrupted several times, the raging spectators were forcibly removed and continued on. It was glory, only not during his lifetime, but posthumously.
And then Nijinsky became mortally tired and in this state went on tour with the troupe to South America. Romola Pulska was on the ship, but there was neither Diaghilev nor the sober-minded Karsavina. Romola attacked the object of her passion so energetically that an engagement was soon announced. They got married in Buenos Aires.
Then Romola began to free her husband from Diaghilev’s shackles, not realizing that Diaghilev, Ballet and Life were synonymous for him. In Rio de Janeiro, Nijinsky refused to perform in the next ballet, Diaghilev considered the contract to be broken. Now Nijinsky could only perform in music halls, which he did for some time. The path to St. Petersburg was prohibited for him as for a person evading military service.
Romola was not to blame. Or she was, but only as Albert in Giselle. She didn't think it would turn out like this. And when I realized what I had done, I focused all my energy on correcting the mistake. She gave birth to Vaclav two daughters, whom he loved very much... while he was getting to know them. She went to bow to Diaghilev, thinking that old impressions would stir up feelings in her husband’s soul, which was lost somewhere. She treated him with insulin shock.
Nijinsky died in 1950.
"The girl and the boy began to cry, and the cheerful booth closed.."
Vaslav Nijinsky
The whole world was at the feet of the dancing Vaslav Nijinsky. “God of dance”, “eighth wonder of the world”, “king of the air” - his contemporaries called him. Nijinsky's jump, when he flew halfway across the stage and hovered above it, seemed mystical. After his performances, the audience screamed, cried, threw flowers, gloves, fans, programs on the stage, overwhelmed with indescribable delight. “I have met few geniuses in my life, and one of them was Nijinsky,” wrote Charles Chaplin. - He enchanted, he was divine, his mysterious darkness seemed to come from other worlds. His every movement was poetry, every jump was a flight into the land of fantasy.”
The whole world imitated Nijinsky, women copied his ballet costumes, made their eyes slant, and this became fashionable only because nature gave him high cheekbones.
Vaslav Nijinsky was born on the night of February 27-28 (March 12), 1889 (according to other sources, 1890) in Kyiv. His parents - Tomasz (Foma) Nijinsky and Eleonora Bereda - were Poles. My father, a hereditary dancer, had his own troupe with which he toured throughout Russia. When Vaclav was nine years old, Tomas Nijinsky left the family for his mistress, and the boy, along with his sister Bronislava, was sent to the St. Petersburg Ballet School.
After graduation, Nijinsky entered the Mariinsky Theater as a soloist. Vaclav was introduced to the 30-year-old Prince Pavel Dmitrievich Lvov, known not only for his wealth and philanthropy, but also for his love for handsome young men. The prince was involved in Nijinsky’s artistic education, paid for his lessons with Maestro Cecchetti, bought a piano, helped furnish the rooms, and gave gold ring with a diamond.
Then Nijinsky fell under the magnetic influence of the personality of Sergei Diaghilev and his artistic ideas. A huge platinum ring with a sapphire from Cartier sparkled on Vaclav’s finger. Diaghilev was a homosexual, while Nijinsky's homosexuality was not given to him by nature. He was born a real man and remained one until his death, which is confirmed, by the way, by his constant trips to brothels.
In 1909, Sergei Diaghilev organized the first season of the Russian Ballet in Paris. The performances were an unprecedented success. One of them, the Armida Pavilion, revealed Nijinsky to the world. When he rose into the air in one leap not far from the wings, described a parabola and disappeared from view, the audience burst into applause. Everyone got the impression that the dancer soared up and flew away. The orchestra stopped. It seemed as if madness had taken over the hall.
Later, Nijinsky was asked how he flies without any apparatus in his hands, behind his back, and whether it is difficult to soar in the air. "Oh no! - answered the artist. “You just need to rise and stay in the air for a moment!”
On January 24, 1911, the whole of St. Petersburg came to the play “Giselle”. The Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna and the Grand Dukes were also there. In the first part, Nijinsky appeared in a suit created according to a sketch by Benois - in tights and a short tunic, just below the waist. He was the first to replace male dancers' wide trousers with tights.
After the performance, Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich went backstage and said that the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna had ordered Nijinsky to be fired for the indecent costume in which he appeared on stage. Which is what was done. But, as it turned out later, Maria Feodorovna did not give such an order; it was an intrigue of the grand dukes.
Diaghilev immediately offered Nijinsky a place in the Russian Ballet. As part of this troupe, Vaclav performed his most famous ballet parts. He danced both in the old repertoire and in countless new productions, touring throughout the continent, performing on different stages in many countries.
The first performance in 1911 shocked the Parisian public. It was "The Phantom of the Rose" to the music of Carl von Weber's "Invitation to the Dance." Nijinsky and his partner Tamara Karsavina danced as if improvising. "The Ghost of the Rose" - one of Fokine's revelations - was created for them.
The poet Jean Cocteau said that Nijinsky conveys the seemingly unrealistic - “the sad and victorious onset of fragrance.” And he concluded: “Nijinsky disappears through the window with a leap so pathetic, so defying the laws of balance, so curved and high, that never now will the volatile scent of a rose touch me without bringing with it this indelible ghost.”
Nijinsky's American debut at the Metropolitan Opera confirmed the correctness of Fokine's words. The audience was as brilliant as in Paris. The program included “Polovtsian Dances”, “The Ghost of the Rose”, “Scheherazade” and “Petrushka”. When Nijinsky appeared in “The Phantom of the Rose,” the audience stood up, and for a second the dancer was embarrassed by such a truly royal reception, but the audience prepared him another surprise in the form of a waterfall of roses. A few seconds later the stage was buried in fragrant petals, and Nijinsky, standing in the midst of this fragrant floral splendor, seemed to be the very soul of a beautiful flower.
In each role - the eastern slave, Petrushka, Harlequin, Chopin - Nijinsky created a bright, unique character. When he danced, everyone forgot about Nijinsky as a person, fascinated by his transformation and completely surrendering to the image he created. As soon as he appeared on stage, it was as if an electric discharge ran through the audience, hypnotized by the purity and perfection of his talent. The audience watched him incessantly, falling into a hypnotic state, so great was the magic of his art.
Hundreds of people dreamed of seeing an amazing artist, meeting him, or simply touching him. society ladies. To lure Nijinsky, they resorted to all sorts of tricks, which for the most part were defeated by the constant vigilance of Diaghilev’s servant Vasily. Only when Diaghilev himself brought someone to Nijinsky did the servant rest from his difficult duties. Close circle friends - Diaghilev, Benois, Bakst, Stravinsky and Nouvel - completely satisfied Vaclav.
The dancer's personality intrigued the audience. The partner of Pavlova and Karsavina, who immediately captivated the Parisians, he was among those for whom the doors of the most prestigious houses opened. Nijinsky knew that he was disappointing expectations with his isolation, he knew that many were disappointed by his “plebeian” appearance, and he suffered from this. And Diaghilev’s social acquaintances shrugged their shoulders when their attempts to communicate with Nijinsky were frustrated by his unsociability. Someone even called him a “brilliant idiot.” Vaclav suspected something similar, because he wrote in his Diary: “I now understand Dostoevsky’s “The Idiot”; I myself was mistaken for an idiot.”
Diaghilev introduced Nijinsky to many French artists who visited ballet performances: Debussy, Ravel, Bourdelle, Blanche, Fauré and Saint-Saens. When they first met, they were always surprised by this calm young man, who only smiled silently during the conversation.
Nijinsky apologized through Diaghilev, constantly refusing numerous receptions, lunches and dinners, but made an exception for Debussy and Jacques-Émile Blanche, who had a wonderful house in Passy. The artist painted a portrait of Nijinsky in costume from the ballet Orientalia. Renaldo Jean gave Vaclav Vestris's autograph, and of all the many gifts, this one was especially dear to him.
The American dancer Isadora Duncan was so captivated by Nijinsky’s talent that she made it clear to Vaslav that she wanted to have a child with him in order to contribute to the birth of a new generation of artists. When Diaghilev, amused, translated the dancer’s proposal to him, Nijinsky only smiled. He has refused similar offers more than once.
The great Charles Chaplin invited the dancer to his film studio. “Serious, amazingly handsome, with slightly protruding cheekbones and sad eyes, he somewhat resembled a monk wearing a secular dress” - this is how Chaplin saw his guest. The audience laughed at the great comedian's tricks, but Nijinsky's face became sadder and sadder. For two more days he watched Chaplin’s work with the same gloomy face. After filming, Nijinsky said: “Your comedy is a ballet. You are a natural dancer."
And the next evening Chaplin went backstage, but the conversation did not work out. Many years later, in his memoirs, Charles would write: “...I was unable to speak. You really can’t, wringing your hands, try to express in words your admiration for great art.”
Diaghilev patronized Nijinsky in every possible way, and in 1912 he even nominated him as a choreographer, removing Fokine from the enterprise. Unconditionally calling Nijinsky a brilliant dancer, Benois was skeptical about Nijinsky the choreographer: “It should be considered a terrible misfortune that Diaghilev, who fully appreciated his friend as an artist, at the same time overestimated his intellect. It seemed to Diaghilev that he could make out of this... something in the life of a being who did not understand anything, some kind of figure and creator...”
Nijinsky's productions were not very successful. An exception can be considered one act ballet“The Afternoon of a Faun” to the music of Claude Debussy with scenery and costumes by Lev Bakst. The dance lasted only 12 minutes and showed a completely different aesthetic of ballet theater.
The premiere of “Faun” took place on May 29, 1912 at the Chatelet Theater and ended in a huge scandal. Wild applause and whistles mingled after the end of one of the most exciting performances in the history of the theater.
Paris was divided into two warring camps. The Prefect of Police has been asked to cancel the next performance of "The Faun" as "indecent." The news spread throughout the city with lightning speed; in salons and clubs, in newspaper editorial offices, on the sidelines of the Chamber of Deputies, they attacked any material containing any information “for” and “against” “Faun”. The famous sculptor Auguste Rodin spoke in defense of the performance. After the performance, he hugged Vaclav: “My dreams have come true. And you did it. Thank you".
On September 1, 1913, while on tour in Buenos Aires, Vaslav Nijinsky unexpectedly married the Hungarian dancer Romola de Pulski. Before this, Romola pursued Vaclav for several months and even began to study ballet in order to be closer to him. Romola gave birth to Nijinsky's daughter Kira.
Sergei Diaghilev, mortally offended by his friend, fired him from the troupe. Vaclav gathered his own ballet troupe and toured with it throughout Europe and America. This tour lasted about a year. Nijinsky was a brilliant dancer, but a bad businessman, and his troupe suffered financial ruin.
During World War I, Nijinsky was captured and imprisoned in Austria-Hungary. He was accused of spying for Russia.
After a forced break, Nijinsky returned to Diaghilev and performed with great success in Argentina, the USA, and Spain.
On September 26, 1917, Nijinsky appeared on stage for the last time in the play “The Phantom of the Rose” by the Diaghilev troupe. He suffered from a serious mental illness - schizophrenia.
Romola invited the best specialists from Europe and America. "Create him best care and a calm environment under the supervision of a psychiatrist,” was all the doctors could say.
Then Nijinska turned to desperate means - fakirs, healers, healers - everything was tried, and everything was in vain.
Experiencing financial difficulties, Romola wrote the book “Nijinsky. The story of a great dancer, told by his wife,” and then published Vaclav’s diaries. “People visit churches in the hope of finding God there,” Nijinsky wrote. - He is not in churches, or rather, He is there wherever we look for Him... I like Shakespeare’s clowns, who have so much humor, but they have evil traits, which is why they move away from God. I appreciate jokes because I am God's clown. But I believe that a clown is ideal only if he expresses love, otherwise he is not God’s clown for me ... "
After the war, Romola took her husband around the world for another five years, trying in vain to cure him. In one of the London hotels he suffered an attack of kidney disease. Romola transported her husband to the clinic, where he died on April 8, 1950. Three years later, the ashes of the great dancer were transported to Paris and buried in the Montmartre cemetery. The monument at the grave was erected only in 1999. The image of Parsley was not chosen by chance. Ellen Terry in her book “Russian Ballet” writes: “It was much easier for him to feel like a doll, half-animal, a faun, than to be himself. He needed a mask."
Vaslav Nijinsky was and remains a legend. Not a year goes by without a ballet, performance, film or play about him appearing. Freddie Mercury demonstrated his love for ballet by performing in a copy of Nijinsky's famous stage costume...
| Vaslav Nijinsky | |
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Vaslav Fomich Nijinsky |
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Russian Empire |
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Vaslav Fomich Nijinsky Polish Wacław Niżyński(March 12, Kyiv, Russian Empire - or April 11, London, UK) - Russian dancer and choreographer of Polish origin, born in Kyiv. One of the leading members of Diaghilev's Russian Ballet. Brother of dancer Bronislava Nijinska. Choreographer of the ballets “The Rite of Spring”, “The Afternoon of a Faun”, “Games” and “Till Eulenspiegel”.
Biography
Vaslav Nijinsky in Le spectre de la rose
Almost immediately after graduating from college, Nijinsky was invited by S.P. Diaghilev to participate in the ballet season, where he gained enormous success. For his ability to jump high and elevate for a long time, he was called the bird-man, the second Vestris.
Nijinsky became Diaghilev's discovery, the first dancer, and then the choreographer of the troupe (1909-1913, 1916).
In Paris, the dance repertoire tested on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater was performed (Armida Pavilion, 1907; Chopinian or La Sylphide, 1907; Egyptian Nights or Cleopatra 1909; Giselle, 1910; Swan Lake, 1911), as well as the divertissement Feast to the music of Russian composers, 1909; and roles in Fokine's new ballets Schumann's Carnival, 1910; Scheherazade by N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov, 1910; Orientals A. Glazunov, 1910; C. M. Weber's Vision of a Rose, 1911, in which he amazed the Parisian public with a fantastic jump through a window; Parsley by I. F. Stravinsky, 1911; Blue God R. Ghana, 1912; Daphnis and Chloe (ballet) by M. Ravel, 1912.
Afternoon of a Faun
Encouraged by Diaghilev, Nijinsky tried his hand as a choreographer and, secretly from Fokine, rehearsed his first ballet - The Afternoon of a Faun to the music of C. Debussy (1912). He based his choreography on profile poses borrowed from ancient Greek vase painting. Like Diaghilev, Nijinsky was fascinated by the rhythmoplastics and eurhythmics of Dalcroze, in the aesthetics of which he staged his next and most significant ballet, The Rite of Spring, in 1913. The Rite of Spring, written by Stravinsky in an atonal system and choreographically built on complex combinations of rhythms, became one of the first expressionist ballets. The ballet was not immediately accepted, and its premiere ended in scandal, as did Afternoon of a Faun, which shocked the public with its final erotic scene. In the same year he performed the plotless ballet Plays by Debussy. These productions by Nijinsky were characterized by anti-romanticism and opposition to the usual grace of the classical style.
The Parisian public was captivated by the artist's undoubted dramatic talent and his exotic appearance. Nijinsky turned out to be a brave and original-minded choreographer who opened new paths in plastic arts, returning male dance to its former priority and virtuosity. Nijinsky also owed his successes to Diaghilev, who believed and supported him in daring experiments.
Marriage
The breakdown of close relations with Diaghilev due to Nijinsky's marriage to the unprofessional dancer Romola Pulskaya led to Nijinsky's departure from the troupe and, in fact, to the end of his short, dizzying career.
Entreprise
After leaving Diaghilev, Nijinsky found himself in difficult conditions. It was necessary to earn a living. A dance genius, he did not have the ability to produce. He rejected the offer to head the Grand Opera ballet in Paris, deciding to create his own enterprise. It was possible to assemble a troupe of 17 people (it included Bronislava’s sister and her husband, who also left Diaghilev) and concluded a contract with the London Palace Theater. The repertoire consisted of productions by Nijinsky and, in part, by Fokine (The Phantom of the Rose, Carnival, La Sylphides, which Nijinsky remade again). However, the tour was not successful and ended in financial ruin, which led to a nervous breakdown and the onset of mental illness for the artist. Failures followed him.
Last premiere
The First World War of 1914 found the couple returning to St. Petersburg with their newborn daughter in Budapest, where they were interned until the beginning of 1916. Nijinsky was painfully worried about both his arrest and his forced creative inactivity. Meanwhile, Diaghilev renewed the contract with the artist for the Russian Ballet tour in North and South America. On April 12, 1916, he danced his signature roles in Petrushka and Vision of a Rose on the stage of the New York Metropolitan Opera. In the same year, on October 23, the premiere of Nijinsky’s last ballet, Till Eulenspiegel by R. Strauss, was shown at the Manhattan Opera in New York, in which he performed the main role. The performance, created in feverish haste, despite a number of interesting discoveries, failed.
Disease
The unrest that he experienced greatly traumatized Nijinsky’s weak psyche. A fatal role in his fate was played by his passion for Tolstoyism, popular in the emigrant circles of the Russian artistic intelligentsia. Members of Diaghilev's troupe, the Tolstoyans Nemchinova, Kostrovsky and Zverev, instilled in Nijinsky the sinfulness of the acting profession, which aggravated his illness.
In 1917, Nijinsky finally left the stage and settled in Switzerland with his family. Here he felt better, he thought about a new system for recording dance, dreamed of his own school, and in 1918 he wrote the book Nijinsky's Diary (published in Paris in 1953).
However, he was soon placed in a mental hospital, where he spent the rest of his life. He died on April 11, 1950 in London.
Reburial of ashes
In 1953, his body was transported to Paris and buried in the Montmartre cemetery next to the graves of the legendary dancer G. Vestris and playwright T. Gautier, one of the creators of romantic ballet. On his gray stone tombstone sits a sad bronze jester.
The significance of Nijinsky's personality
- Nijinsky made a bold breakthrough into the future of ballet art, discovering the later established style of expressionism and fundamentally new possibilities of plastic arts. His creative life was short (only ten years), but intense. Maurice Bejart's famous ballet “Nijinsky, God's Clown” to the music of Pierre Henri and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, 1971, is dedicated to the personality of Nijinsky.
- The best ballets with the participation of Vaslav Nijinsky are “The Rite of Spring” and “The Afternoon of a Faun”.
Memory
- In 1984, in Queen's video for the song I Want to Break Free, frontman Freddie Mercury appeared as a faun from the ballet Afternoon of a Faun, in which Nijinsky became famous.
- In 1990, director Philippe Valois made the film “Nijinsky, God’s Puppet” about the life of a dancer
- In 1999, at the theater on Malaya Bronnaya “Nijinsky, God’s Crazy Clown” (Nijinsky - A. Domogarov)
- Dedicated to Nijinsky and his circle music album“Nijinsky”, recorded by the group “Laida” in 2000 (second version in 2002).
- In 2008, the State Academic Central Puppet Theater named after S. V. Obraztsov hosted the premiere of the play “Nijinsky, God’s Crazy Clown” based on the play by G. Blumstein (director and performer of the role of Nijinsky - Honored Artist of Russia Andrei Dennikov).
- In 2011, for the centenary of the Diaghilev Russian Ballet Company, Vaslav and Bronislav Nijinsky, the legendary Polish dancers, were sculpted by Gennady Ershov in the role of a faun and a nymph from the ballet Afternoon of a Faun, a bronze sculpture installed in the foyer Bolshoi Theater Warsaw.
- The performance NN of the Lublin Dance Theater (choreographer Ryszard Kalinowski) is dedicated to Vaslav Nijinsky (
