Erosion of technique

[floss]

Recently I have been noticing there seems to be more promotional photographs in dance magazines that have dancers showing poor technique. In one Australian magazine there is a photo of a dancer with a terrible line in arabesque, the foot seems to be not pointed, neither leg is correctly turned out and her weight seems to be in her heels, (she is not on pointe). I would like to scan the photo and post it but it would probably be not appropriate as far as copyright goes and anyway the photo is one of those slightly "arty" (grainy, b/w) images and may not turn out well. The erosion of technique is one of my gripes, I have posted about it before. Do you think it is on the increase in the context of advertising?, i.e showing high extensions instead of line to encourage people to go to that studio. I find it really strange that a school director would want to advertise their studio by using images that show poor technique. Or am I getting old and picky? :shrug:

[Alexandra]

I don't think you're being too picky at all -- write a letter to the editor!

I'll make a guess at what happened -- no dance professional got to approve the shot. It was done by the advertising people on both ends, and they can't see what you see.

Dancers: insist on approval before photographs are released!!!

[Amy Reusch]

I wonder if sometimes promotional material isn't done with donated graphic services. Dance Connecticut's fall brochure was just dreadful... you'd almost think they despised ballet... the other dance forms seem relatively well presented... it's so poor that I can't imagine any of the directors of the school actually vetted the images. It must have something to do with not wanting to look a gift horse in the mouth for fear of offending a sponsor.

[BW]

floss, it does appear in the US too. My daughter will point as a photo for a particular program and remark that she'd never want to attend if that is their "best". It's scary and particularly disturbing if it's an advertisement for a ballet school or college program.

[citibob]

It could be an erosion in the photographic evaluation process, not necessarily the technique. It's so easy to make bad photos, I've seen many of myself. In our photo shoots, most of them get thrown out for one reason or another (one person had a turned-in arabesque, etc). I even saw a photo of a well-known ballet company with dancers in the air in grand saut de chat: the legs were bent and the feet limp. It WAS a journalistic photo. The moral of the story is be very careful what you let journalists photograph. If possible, provide them with your own photos.

[Guest Banana Feet]

I've noticed this recently too. I just wonder why the people would put it in a magazine when it looks horrible I'm less inclined to buy a product that is shown in an ad where the dancer is horribly misplaced. The company I modeled for before has done this a few times, which I don't understand because they have other photos of dancers who look great :shrug:

[Tiffany]

I've noticed this too! Also, some of the dance catalogues have models with sickled feet or in arabesque leaning too far forward, or not turned out... I guess they don't have the opportunity to get a person with good dance training to proof the shots. I do appreciate Discount Dance's catalogue-I don't think I've ever seen poor technique modeled on their pages!

I also won't buy ballerina Christmas tree ornaments that do not have correct technique-I always think "Why didn't they have a person who dances proof their design before they went to construction?" Or, scary though it is, maybe they did have someone look at their design, and no mistakes were seen.

[Simon G]

A number of things occur to me on this. Firstly a dancer's eye is trained to technique, they spot things, which a normal putner wouldn't.

On the subject of dance journalism photography, if the photographer is not skilled or experienced he takes pictures of movement, that's what excites him, the most dramatic shot is often not an academically correct one. Moreover, even if they are the final decision as to which picture is chosen is often in the hands of a picture editor or editor on newspapers certainly and their knowledge of dance is non-existant in terms of academic precision. To them it's what looks edgiest.

However, on the subject of hoiked hips etc etc in companies who should know better, the answer is plain and simply that whilst academic technique is what a dancer would appreciate it's just not that sexy, or rather it's not as sexy as the distorted extented line that hoiking hips, turning in, hyperextending etc can produce.

Remember the object of advertising is to appeal to as wide a catchment area as possible, and to extend the existing number of punters, the extremity of what a dancer can produce when not conforming to academic precision is, to the untrained eye, a very sexy, extreme image, which sells.

Great dance photography is actually pretty rare. Because mostly it's incredibly easy to take an interesting photograph of dancers. It's those very very rare occasions when the photo transcends the thrill of the visceral pleasure of what a dancer can do with their body and become an artistic object in its own right. The Anthony Crickmay book of Lynn Seymour photos being a brilliant example of this.

[citibob]

Dance mail order catalogs are out to sell items at a discount. They have little need to pay top dollar for top photos of top dancers. My impression of most of the pictures in Discount Dance Supply is rather low. And yet I buy a lot from them because they stock it, they have good prices, and they get it to me fast. I don't really care how bad their pictures are. They're selling me clothing, not dancers.

That's different from a dance COMPANY, in which I expect pictures to look good.

[Simon G]

I know that you meant dance companies. I've seen those photos too, wildly distorted bodies ignoring the basics of technique, and I've pointed these faults out to non dance friends who can't see what I'm getting at.

But finally I understand why these photos have been chosen. To a dance officionado the image is unaesthetic, to the normal eye it is a stunning, impossible image and sexy and alluring and inviting. It's what advertising is all about.

I don't know if you remember Katherine Kanter? A few years ago in one of her very funny essays she posted two photos of dancers in arabesque, one of Maria Semeyonova from the old Bolshoi in an academically correct arabesque, the other of Sylvie Guillem in all her hyperextended hip up, supporting leg turning in, foot higher than her head glory. Kat, of course lauded Semeyonova and lambasted Guillem (no surprises there) but in terms of academic classicism, I suppose she actually had a point.

The only thing is, I know who'd sell out an opera house by the image portrayed of their arabesque, technically correct or not.

[Mel Johnson]

Yes, arabesque does get old after awhile. I can't say I enjoy the prospect of three acts of nothing but arabesque.

[Amy Reusch]

Firstly a dancer's eye is trained to technique, they spot things, which a normal putner wouldn't.

What is a "putner"? Is it a typo, slang or an occupation?

Yes, arabesque does get old after awhile. I can't say I enjoy the prospect of three acts of nothing but arabesque.

No, but The Shades opening is kind of nice... if we're talking about repetitive..

[floss]

I should have specified clearly that the photo in question was one attached as advertisement for a ballet school for pre-professional students, it was a pose not an action shot. It was not advertising clothing etc. The school ( not a Dolly Dinkle one) is run by a well known ex-dancer from European companies. I am just completely suprised that an advertisement for her school would use an image that shows poor technique. And also cannot fathom why she would allow such a photo to be used, maybe she did not see it prior to submission to the magazine. My daughters went Eww when they saw the picture. I am aware of students at my daughters' school being used as models, they were chosen on the basis of being able to display good technique, the AD vetted the photos before they were submitted and the photographer was one that takes performance photos. Anyway, I hope that these images are not going to become the norm.

[Mel Johnson]

Yes, arabesque does get old after awhile. I can't say I enjoy the prospect of three acts of nothing but arabesque.

No, but The Shades opening is kind of nice... if we're talking about repetitive..

No, I mean just arabesque. Like Paul Taylor just standing there. Shades, after all, has some other steps in the entrée and it moves. (cf. The Duke's speech on toffee in Act I Patience.)

[Simon G]

Yes, arabesque does get old after awhile.  I can't say I enjoy the prospect of three acts of nothing but arabesque.

That may well be the case for you Mel. But I've since heard that the Kirov/Marinksy are restaging a complete four act authentic version of the arabesque, complete with restored mime scenes with authentic arabesque mime notes prised from the hands of Petipa in his grave.

[Mel Johnson]

If that were his last work, thank heaven he died!

[Andre Yew]

I'm annoyed, too, by depictions of ballet dancers that are wrong --- there's a lot of sculpture I've seen with turned in legs in what appears to be classical technique. However, for a picture of a dancer for a dance company, unless one knows what choreography's being danced, how does one know whether the "error" is actually an error, or intended to look like that? For example, a lot of Balanchine or Forsythe would look wrong in the classical context.

--Andre