jennifer fournier

On Monday morning shortly after reading the article you are discussing I sent the following letter to the Editors at the Globe and Mail. It appeared only in the print edition of the Tuesday edition. It read After reading some of the comments on the board i would also like to add that my somewhat defensive remarks about how being a mother has made me a better artist and person were in response to Hampson's assertion during the interview that Georgia O'Keefe felt being a mother resulted in a loss of creativity and that a woman had in effect to choose between being an artist or a mother. That has simply not been true for me. Careful readers will also note that the words "all they have are" do not appear in quotation marks. In the article there is no mention of how our profession has changed its attitudes toward dancers having children but to me that is implicit in any discussion of ballerinas with babies. Isn't that exactly why people are now writing articles about it? It would also have been impossible to imagine when I was a young girl that dancers could one day get a degree while still dancing as a recent NYT article discussed. Can you still achieve greatness with a term paper due the next day or a sick baby that keeps you at home?? I'm not sure about that and while I would never place myself in the category of great dancers I don't know if I could have danced as long or with the same drive if I had had a child earlier in my career . It is a very interesting topic for discussion but no one can deny that there was once a day that dancers were not encouraged to give much thought to a life after dance . As anyone who knows me will attest my two greatest role models have been Suzanne Farrell and Karen Kain-not only do i adore them as people but could not hold them in higher regard as ballerinas and artists. That my comments in any way could be seen as a slight towards them or any ballerina without children has caused me great personal pain and an impression I would desperately like to rectify.