Alexei Ratmansky With His Family In Kiev, Left His Ballet in Moscow


Alexei Ratmansky, former artistic director of the Bolshoi Ballet and choreographer currently residing at the American Ballet Theatre, was preparing a new ballet at the Bolshoi in Moscow, when Russian President Vladimir V. Putin made the announcement early Thursday morning, in neighboring Ukraine. He said he invaded.

Ratmansky, who grew up in Kiev and danced there early in his career, decided to leave Moscow immediately and, with the Bolshoi’s help, made arrangements to travel to New York via Warsaw with the rest of his international creativity. set.

“It was like we were speeding towards the finish on a fast-moving train,” Mr. Ratmansky said of the rehearsal period in an interview Saturday. “The news was bad, but I was absolutely torn between creation, love, and despair – all those words. I thought I wouldn’t be able to continue if real military action started, but until then I’ll try to ignore the news, be professional and just do my job,” he said.

The ballet, designated as Bach’s ‘Art of the Fugue’, was to premiere on March 30 but was postponed indefinitely. Katerina Novikova, head of the Bolshoi press office, when asked for comment, pointed to a statement on the matter. the theater’s websiteHe says it was delayed after “talks with the preparation team”.

The ballet was not officially cancelled. “This project is extremely important for the Bolshoi Theatre, a significant amount of work has been done so far and we hope to realize this project,” the statement says. Mr. Ratmansky is reported to have said, “I hope to return to Moscow when the time comes to complete production.”

But after watching the brutality of the invasion, he said he wasn’t sure when that would happen. Most of his family lives in Ukraine. “If Putin was still president, I doubt I would have gone,” he said.

He slept in his room at the Metropol Hotel across a plaza across from the Bolshoi on Wednesday night, alarmed by the ominous reports that Russian troops on the Ukrainian border had seen in the international media. But he said he did not expect the full-scale attack hours later. “I thought nothing would change,” he said. “There has been conflict with separatists along the border since 2014.” His wife, Tatiana, woke him up on Thursday morning and called him from New York with the news. “The first thing I did was call the Bolshoi and arrange to leave.”

In addition to the “Art of Fugue”, Mr. Ratmansky has an even bigger project that seems unlikely to be completed anytime soon: a generous, historically informed production of the 1862 Petipa ballet “The Pharaoh’s Daughter.” st. Mariinsky Ballet in St. Petersburg.

“Pharaoh’s Daughter” was due to premiere in mid-Mayhowever, Mr. Ratmansky informed Mariinsky that he would not be able to return to finish the ballet in April as planned, given the situation.

Mr. Ratmansky is Ukrainian and Russian. His parents, sister, nieces and nephews live in Kiev, as do the family of the Ukrainian Ms. Ratmansky.

Mr. Ratmansky makes frequent phone calls with his family. His parents, in their 80s, took shelter in the basement of their downtown building before heading to a small cottage about an hour from the city. Other family members took shelter in underground garages and basements.

They are all safe for now, and Mr. Ratmansky said, “I am trying to protect their souls.”

When asked whether the current conflict brings back memories of the war for her mother, who experienced the Siege of Leningrad, and her father, who had to be evacuated from Kiev before the Nazi occupation and lost many family members in the Holocaust, Ratmansky replied, “We didn’t talk about it. We just said ‘are you okay?’ we’re talking about.”

The reflections of the Russian occupation have already begun to be felt in the cultural circles of Russia. Chief close to Mr Putin, Valery Gergiev, Concerts canceled at Carnegie Hall. The Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Gergiev, threatened to terminate his contract if he did not raise his voice against the occupationJust like La Scala did in Milan. A Bolshoi Ballet tour to London’s Royal Opera House this summer has been cancelled. Russia was uninvited even from the public Eurovision Song Contest.

“Both of these projects are very close to my heart,” Mr. Ratmansky said of his ballets. But right now the only thing that matters is Ukraine’s survival, its independence and the survival of our families.”



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