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Dance has been a form of expression and entertainment for thousands of years, but before Martha Graham’s time there were limited styles of performing dance. To understand how Graham pushed passed the confines of dance its is essential to capture the essence of Ballet since it was the convention before her. Ballet was the primary form of entertainment but was not performed on a proscenium stage until the mid-Eighteenth Century.(4) Before then, the makeshift stage was located in the center of the audience and performed on the same level as the audience members on the floor of a large hall.
Dance has been a form of expression and entertainment for thousands of years, but before Martha Graham’s time there were limited styles of performing dance. To understand how Graham pushed passed the confines of dance its is essential to capture the essence of Ballet since it was the convention before her. Ballet was the primary form of entertainment but was not performed on a proscenium stage until the mid-Eighteenth Century.(4) Before then, the makeshift stage was located in the center of the audience and performed on the same level as the audience members on the floor of a large hall.
At this time there was only one form of ballet that had not changed since its creation. There were still the same stories, costumes, and choreography; however, in 1832 Filippo Taglioni’s ballet, La Sylphide marked the start of Romantic Ballet with the use of pointe shoes.(5) They were used in Romantic Ballet to emphasized the dancer’s delicacy. At this time in the Nineteenth Century, Taglioni's work initiated the divide of Ballet into two different styles: Romantic and Classical.
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Romantic Ballet
Romantic Ballet was a continuation of the prior style but with added influence of Romanticism in art; like before, the female dancers were the center of attention while the men merely supported them. Male dancers fought to gain the popularity of their female counterparts like Marie Taglloni and Fanny Elssler but fell short because their inferior roles (6). This style of dance stuck to mythical themes, featuring supernatural creatures such as fairies. The pieces were never set in reality, even the dancers were designed to exude fantasy through their costumes and movement. The goal was for the female dancers to appear surreal in their perfection, wings were occasionally used to show the dancer's etherial qualities. Similarly, after Taglioni's La Sylphide, pointe shoes were used universally because they made women appear like "heavenly being visiting the earth but barely touching it" (7). Romantic Ballet became repetitive, the endless unrealistic story lines lacked individuality. The more audiences watched this style of dance they desired choreography and dancers they could relate to instead of weightless creatures designed to look fake in their perfection.
Classical Ballet
Classical Ballet differed from its relative Romantic Ballet in the sense that the emphasis was on technique more than the mystical themes. One focus centered on the shapes created by the dancers through their extension. To do so one stretches past the lines created by the dancers limbs, fully completing each movement. Even the dancer's costumes were altered to further the illusion, by shortening the hem of the tutus, more leg is revealed allowing the lines created to be even longer. Classical Ballet also featured principal dancers from both genders who shared the leading roles in the productions.