108 años

Tal día como hoy -un 22 de enero- pero en 1904, Marius Petipa escribió en su diario personal: “Todo mi trabajo se ha reducido a cenizas”. Así pintaban las cosas en Rusia. Ese mismo día, sin embargo, nacía George Balanchine.

Si Petipa hubiera podido ver la que se le venía encima, probablemente habría pensado de forma diferente; porque Balanchine, precisamente porque puso todo patas arriba, hizo por fin visible la majestuosidad de la obra de Petipa. Es como si alguien tuviera que llevarnos la contraria para que tengamos que sacar toda nuestra artillería pesada y finalmente, se haga la luz.

Hay tanto Petipa -como Bournonville- en Balanchine… Precisamente porque quiso oponerse a las filas de bailarinas con tutús terminó haciendo Symphony in C, y precisamente porque no le interesaban las historietas de vodevil, acabó diciendo aquello de que un ballet puede no tener argumento pero siempre tiene un significado; que cuando un hombre alarga una mano en el escenario y la mujer le mira, y le abraza, ya tenemos toda una historia contada. Qué simple todo y qué sofisticado.

Es una pena que en el día a día nos falte la perspectiva para mirar lejos en el horizonte, porque veríamos que vamos arrastrando nuestro pasado, casi siempre brillantemente y por algún motivo, aunque nos fastidie. Tanto como fue acumulando Balanchine para que hoy, 108 después de su nacimiento, sigamos teniendo en él un referente absoluto al agarrarnos a la barra cada mañana.

On January 22nd, back in 1904, Marius Petipa wrote in his personal diary: “All my work is reduced to ashes.” That’s the way things were in Russia. However, that same day, George Balanchine was born.

If Petipa could have seen what was coming next, maybe he would have thought very differently, just because Balanchine put everything upside down and he finally brought out all the majesty of Petipa’s work. It is like when somebody argues, and then you have to bring out all your heavy artillery… so finally there is light.

There is so much Petipa -and Bournonville- in Balanchine… It was just because he wanted to stop all those endless lines of tutu-dancers, that he finally created Symphony in C; and it was just because he was not interested in vaudeville-plot ballets, he ended up saying that a ballet may have no story, but it always has a meaning; because when a man extends his hand and the woman looks at him, and embraces him, then we have a whole story on stage. How simple and how sophisticated at the same time.

It’s a shame that we don’t have the apropriate perspective to look far enough, because maybe we would see that we are dragging our past, often brilliantly and always for a reason, although we know it’s tough. Balanchine dragged so many things throughout his life that today, 108 after he was born, we still have him as a a brilliant reference when we go to the barre every morning.