To Live is to Dance

By Walter Kish

On a recent lazy Sunday afternoon, looking for something to do without having to brave the arctic conditions outdoors for any unwarranted length of time, I decided to visit the National Museum of History, it being a short ten-minute walk from my quarters here in Kyiv.

The museum, though modest in comparison to some of the museums I have been to in Europe or North America, has a pretty decent collection covering Ukrainian history back to the prehistoric age. Unfortunately, it is a sad fact that most of the archeological and artistic treasures from Ukraine’s past were pillaged by the Russians and now find their home in museums in Moscow or St. Petersburg. Nonetheless, I spent a pleasant several hours admiring Trypillian pottery; Scythian jewellery; a miniature to-scale reconstruction of Kyiv from the time of Sviatoslav the Wise; Kozak weaponry; coins and currency from Roman and Byzantine times to the present; Soviet-era propaganda, and even photos and memorabilia from last year’s Orange Revolution. Rounding out my tour, I came to the last gallery on the third floor and encountered a special exhibit dedicated to the memory of the noted Ukrainian Serge Lifar. Serge who?

Now, I like to think that I am pretty familiar with Ukrainian history and culture and know something about most of the leading Ukrainians who have made their mark over the centuries; however, the name Serge Lifar didn’t ring any bells within my mental archives. Suffice it to say that a tour through this special exhibit and some subsequent research rectified this deficiency in my database of Ukrainian knowledge.

Serge Lifar, for the record, is one of the most prominent names on the world stage of twentieth-century ballet. He was born in Kyiv in 1905 and first took interest in the ballet as a teenager. Despite a late start, under the tutelage of Bronislava Nijinsky, the sister of the ballet world’s most famous dancer Vaclav Nijinsky, Lifar proved to be a genuine prodigy. Interestingly enough, Nijinsky, the star of Sergei Diaghilev’s world famous Ballet Russe troupe, was also born in Kyiv some 15 years before Lifar.

   In the early 1920s, Lifar joined Diaghilev’s troupe in Paris and, in 1923, succeeded Nijinsky to become its principal dancer. George Ballanchine joined Ballet Russe shortly thereafter and, recognizing Lifar’s talent, created choreography that specifically showcased the young phenomenon’s talents. Lifar quickly became acknowledged as the leading star of the ballet world of that time. 

In 1925, Lifar assumed the principal position at the Paris Opera Ballet and in 1929 became its director. He proceeded to revolutionize French ballet, evolving it from its more staid classical orientation into a more modern and dynamic one. He was a dance purist, insisting that the dance was the core element, with music simply a subordinate complement. In one of his ballet creations, Icarus, he took this approach to its extreme by dispensing with music altogether, using only basic percussion as an accompaniment. Against the grain of ballet tradition, he preferred to create the choreography first and add the musical score after, in conformity with the dance movements.

The Second World War and the occupation of Paris by the Germans proved to be a trying time for Lifar and his ballet theatre. His efforts to artistically preserve his troupe and the French ballet tradition brought him accusations of collaborating with the German occupiers. And, indeed, it is true that he frequently spent time lobbying highly placed German officials and even visited Germany and met with Hitler. After the war he was brought before France’s official collaboration tribunal. Despite strong support from the Parisian artistic and cultural community, he was dismissed from the Paris Opera Ballet, though more serious charges of collaboration were dropped.

After a brief stint with the Ballet de Monte Carlo, Lifar returned as director of the Paris Opera Ballet in 1947 and continued to serve in that capacity until 1958 when he retired and moved to Lausanne, Switzerland, where he died in 1986. Aside from his stellar career as a dancer, choreographer and artistic director, Lifar is also known for his many books on dance and choreography.

Lifar was a profound example of the old adage that “to dance is to live, and to live is to dance.”