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Mikhail Fokin: a short biography, creativity, personal life, photo

Modern ballet can not be imagined without Mikhail Fokin. He had a revolutionary influence on this art form. An outstanding ballet reformer, which became the basis for the glory of the Russian school throughout the world in the 20th century, is Mikhail Fokin. He lived a bright life. Formation of the artist took place in difficult times, but it did not break his spirit and only strengthened the belief in the power of art.

Childhood

Mikhail Fokin, whose brief biography can not fit in a few words - the progenitor of the modern ballet, began his journey in a far from dance environment. He was born into a family of a prosperous merchant, and his father categorically refused to see his son as a dancer. But the mother, obsessed with ballet art, was able to resist the opinion of her husband. She gave her son to the choreography school, to the class of the representative of the famous ballet dynasty Nikolai Legat, especially since the boy had great natural talents. Also, Misha's teachers were Pavel Gerdt and Platon Karsavin, outstanding dancers of their time. The Petersburg School attached exceptional importance to ballet technique, and pupils spent many hours in classes, and also took part in the productions of the Mariinsky Theater. Therefore, the basic formation of Mikhail Fokin took place in a ballet environment, he was imbued with the spirit of the classical school, seeing its merits and demerits.

Family education helped the little dancer to get initial knowledge of music and drawing and develop his natural abilities, later Mikhail even seriously thought about his artistic career. And, of course, this knowledge was useful to him when working as a director.

Ballet career

To perform on the great stage of the Mariinsky Theater, Fokin began in his school years, he was involved in the plays "The Nutcracker" and "The Sleeping Beauty". At the end of the school he was enrolled in the theater company, and he quickly grew to a soloist, performing the roles in "Corsair", "Sleeping Beauty", "Awakening Flora" and other productions.

However, the dance did not give him a sense of fullness of life, he saw himself as a director. Observing the work of the outstanding choreographers M. Petipa and L. Ivanov, Mikhail Fokin developed his own view of the classical ballet, and he had a firm opinion on the need to modernize the dance.

Mikhail Fokin: the choreographer-innovator

The first performances Fokine was entrusted even while studying at the school. But he becomes a true choreographer only in 1905, and later will be officially accepted as director at the Mariinsky Theater. Studying the dance system of M. Petipa, Fokine begins to formulate his own theory. Even as a budding dancer, he wrote a letter to the management of the theater with proposals for reforming the ballet productions, but then they simply did not pay attention to him.

The first notable works appear in 1907-08: "Egyptian Nights", "Dying Swan", "Chopiniana", when the famous ballet master Mikhail Fokin becomes more and more famous. The biography changes dramatically after his meeting with Sergei Diaghilev. An entrepreneur asked the director to take part in the creation of ballet performances for tours in Paris. For three years, Fokine is the only choreographer of the Russian seasons, over the years he was able to gather around him an outstanding team, which included A. Benois, L. Bakst, Anna Pavlova, V. Nizhinsky, I. Rubinshtein, T. Karsavina. He creates his outstanding works, which still delight the audience. These performances are "Scheherazade", "Carnival", "Firebird", "Underwater kingdom", "Narcissus", "Blue God", "Phantom of the Rose", and the top of creativity - "Petrushka" to the music of I. Stravinsky.

Until 1918, Fokin combined work with Diaghilev with productions in the Mariinsky, but events in Russia forced him to leave the country, eventually he moved to the United States, where he opened the first ballet school and staged performances with Russian music: "Russian Holidays", "Thunderbird" , "Paganini" to the music of S. Rachmaninov and "Russian soldier" Prokofiev. In total for his life Fokine has staged 70 ballets, each of which has its finds. He instills America's love of classical ballet, forming a national school and tradition. Fokine's ballets became the real asset of dance art in the 20th century, he was able to create his own school and made a number of discoveries.

"Against the Current": the reformist ideas of Mikhail Fokin

At the beginning of the 20th century the ballet was not going through the best of times, it was considered a dying art, it needed a new impetus for development. The dance needed a new creator-savior, and Mikhail Fokin became such a choreographer for the Russian ballet. Creativity of this artist forever changed the idea of classical dance and gave the ballet a new impetus to development. Fokin's reform consisted in the fact that he proposed creating not separate dances, but whole works in which plastic, music and decorations were harmoniously combined. Also, his merit was the revival of the male dance, which had completely disappeared by that time. He creates new genres: ballets-miniatures, plotless plastic sketches.

Cooperation with the great

In his work, Fokin tried to cooperate only with like-minded people, people who are in love with art. He was imbued with the ideas of the circle "The World of Art" and actively attracted outstanding artists to create their own productions. A separate topic in the biography of the choreographer is a tandem: Mikhail Fokin and Anna Pavlova. Together they began to work on the play "Chopiniana", which was fully demonstrated by the genius of both creators.

Another great success of Fokine was the discovery of Václav Nijinsky, whom he saw in the classroom and invited to his play. For several years the dancer was engaged in every play of Fokine.

Private life

The life of geniuses is often difficult to combine with the family, but there are lucky ones who manage to unite it, this was Mikhail Fokin. The director's wife, the ballerina Vera Antonova, took part in Fokine's productions, she gave birth to a choreographer for her son, and also helped her husband all her life.

In particular, with her help, a ballet school was opened in New York, in which Fokine worked until the end of his life.

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