Ballets Russes: The Art of Costume

Overview

We are pleased to announce that the landmark exhibition Ballets Russes: the Art of Costume, which was held in Australia in 2010, will be shown at the National Art Center, Tokyo from 18 June to 1 September, 2014. The exhibition celebrates Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes (Russian Ballet), the dance company that revolutionized ballet with its sensational fusion of art, movement and music.
Featuring 144 costumes and accessories from 33 Ballets Russes productions, as well as costume and set design drawings, photography and original programs, this exhibition brings to life the Ballets Russes’ avant-garde performances that electrified audiences in Europe, the Americas and Australia from 1909 to 1940.
Russian-born Sergei Diaghilev was instrumental in bringing together the finest artists of the early 20th century including visual artists, composers and choreographers to create a new modern art form. The Paris-based company originated in Russia under Diaghilev’s charismatic leadership – but they never performed there. They toured throughout Europe, Britain and the United States of America and brought together the talents of composers such as Igor Stravinsky (who launched his career with the Ballets Russes and was Diaghilev’s closest musical collaborator), and Claude Debussy; choreographers, Michel Fokine, Leonide Massine and George Balanchine and dancers such as Vaslav Nijinsky, Anna Pavlova and Thamar Karsavina.
After Diaghilev’s untimely death in 1929, several new companies were formed to continue and develop his legacy, the most important being Les Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo, formed in Monaco in 1932 by the Russian entrepreneur Colonel Wassily de Basil. This company toured internationally, including tours in Australia three times during the 1930s, enthralling audiences with its productions, sparking an appreciation of modern European art and setting the foundations for modern dance companies in Australia.
In this exhibition are costumes that were designed to be worn and breathed in on the stage, but which are also works of art by some of the greatest modern artists and theatre designers of the early 20th century, including Léon Bakst, Alexandre Benois, Nicholas Roerich, Aleksandr Golovin, Henri Matisse, Georges Braque, Natalia Goncharova, André Derain, Giorgio de Chirico and Pavel Tchelitchew.
This collection of Ballets Russes costumes, one of the largest and finest in the world, is significant for the National Gallery of Australia, which aims to celebrate modernism and to show how arts across all media contribute to an understanding of its influence.
The National Gallery of Australia’s collection of Ballets Russes costumes began with the purchase of nearly 400 significant pieces at a Sotheby’s auction in London in 1973, with another considerable purchase made in 1976. The Gallery has added to the collection in the decades following and this exhibition includes new acquisitions made in the last few years.