Of Architecture and Mirages

"Mirage," a new ballet by Peter Martins, performed by the New York City Ballet. Photo by Paul Kolnik.

Hard to believe, but the eight-week New York City Ballet season is almost over. There is less than a week to go until the final performance, Darci Kistler’s farewell. It’s the end of an era—Kistler was the last ballerina to be personally selected by Balanchine, shortly before his death. Now, thirty years later, she will take her leave, severing the final, physical link to the Master—though of course many in the staff and leadership of the company and its training program (the School of American Ballet) danced under his tutelage )including the artistic director, Peter Martins. Kistler’s final performance will take place this Sunday, and she will dance a program of works by Balanchine and Martins, who is her husband.

The season began forcefully, with an evening of Balanchine masterpieces: “Concerto Barocco,” from 1941, “The Four Temperaments,” from 1946, and “Symphony in Three Movements,” from 1972. Three powerful statements about music and movement, stripped of costumes or sets, still striking in their modernity, and even more, in their compelling structure and emotional coherence. A proclamation of the power of the ballet, and a slap in the face to those who belittle it as ornamental or outmoded.

Then came the “Architecture of Dance” festival of new works: seven ballets, four commissioned scores, and five sets by the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, creator of soaring, whimsical designs (and the architect of the future transportation hub at the World Trade Center). Each week revealed a new work, by some of the most active choreographers around: Alexei Ratmansky, Benjamin Millepied, Wayne McGregor, Christopher Wheeldon, Melissa Barak, Mauro Bigonzetti, and this week, Peter Martins. As one could expect, some were better than others. Who fell into what camp was also relatively predictable. Until this week, two of the ballets, Ratmansky’s fantastical “Namouna, a Grand Divertissement,” and Wheeldon’s rollicking gaucho fantasy, “Estancia,” were truly successful, and I look forward to seeing them again in the coming seasons.

So we come to Peter Martins’ “Mirage,” set to a score co-commissioned from the Finnish composer/conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen. The piece is a violin concerto composed for the young violinist Leila Josefowicz. Salonen conducted, and Josefowicz played at the ballet’s première (she will play all the performances). In a way, it was the only one of the new ballets that truly conformed to the spirit of the festival. In addition to using music by a contemporary composer for whom Martins has an affinity, it uses a truly architectural, three-dimensional set design, which is true of only two other ballets in the festival— all the others used lighting or painted backdrops. More importantly, the three-dimensional design is integrated into the movement and shape of the work, which is not true of the other two. Martins and Calatrava actually discussed the role of the sculpture, and it shows. As he says in an interview in “Playbill”: “I actually choreographed to Calatrava before I choreographed the dance.”

So, what does it look like? Essentially, it’s an enormous bi-valve which can be opened or closed, as well as tilted to various angles. Its frame is latticed with supple ribs that look like strings, which vibrate in the light or when the structure is moved. It is imposing but transparent, looming but insubstantial. As the ballet progresses, we see it from various angles, and in several states of closure—at times it resembled an enormous rain-cloud, a claw, an oyster, a space station. In the adagio section, it became a claw that menaced the dancers, then closed completely and hovered above them like a benevolent planet. Sometimes it encompasses the entire width of the stage, becoming an ever-present element, like the weather. The clicking and whirring of the mechanism used to manipulate it created a curiously comforting effect, a sense of movement in space and time. In the final tableau, it was illuminated in rainbow colors, a somewhat sentimental, but still beautiful image.

Calatrava’s abstract structure is echoed by the futuristic costumes, which make the men look more than a little like superheroes—gray body-suits with diamond shapes cut out of the side of the torso and cinched calves. The women look like a nineteen-sixties, mini-dress version of Princess Leia—short white tunic dresses, again with the diamond-shaped cut-outs on the sides.

Salonen’s violin concerto is a striking piece that merits several hearings. Clearly a virtuoso showpiece for Josefowicz, it is also lushly orchestrated, in a cold sort of way, floating in a shimmering atmosphere of smeared chords and ragged textures. The violin soars, scratches, performs gypsy runs, and even pulsates—in the third movement, it does battle with a powerful, syncopated percussion section. It feels like a vast, jagged landscape, in harmony with the strange constellation evoked by Calatrava’s hanging sculpture. Martins responds to this icy lushness, and to Calatrava’s designs, in his own, highly cerebral way. There are a few movement motifs, reminiscent of other Martins ballets, shapes that come back again and again. The arms are almost always in third position, with one arm extended above the head, the other to the side. The legs slice through the air in clean lines, in an oft-repeated grand rond-de-jambe-en l’air (a half-circle of the leg, curving up from the floor), from the back to the front. The body is arranged with strong diagonals, almost never upright, in a constant state of off-kilter motion. Turns are fast and multiple, often on bent legs. Most markedly, there are almost no curved lines anywhere to be seen. When dancers come together in one of the many pas de deux, the partnering is complex and highly manipulative; unlike with other choreographers, it is often the woman who grapples with the man’s body as support, rather than the man actively moving her body into shapes. The male dancer becomes a support, a mechanism for the woman to grab onto in order to twist her body this way and that. The movements are handsome, but seldom striking in and of themselves. They show off the dancers’ competence and polish—these dancers can do anything, and convincingly—but not much else.

Jennie Somogyi and Jared Angle in Peter Martins' "MIrage." Photo by Paul Kolnik.

Particularly strong were Jennie Somogyi (and her rock-solid partner Jared Angle) in the extended adagio, and Chase Finlay throughout. Somogyi is a senior ballerina with the company (she joined in 1993) who suffered a terrible injury in 2004 that kept her out for well over a year. She is an expansive, commanding dancer with very strong technique and a luscious, pliant body, who attacks every role with utter commitment. She is not used enough in new works, and it was good to see her in this slow, elaborate adagio, though, like the rest of the ballet, it did not allow for much individuality or nuance to shine through. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Chase Finlay is a young corps-member who joined in the company only two years ago. Tall, golden-haired, and beautifully-proportioned, he performs every movement with a lyricism and stretch that are remarkable. In addition to this, he has a soaring jump, with a lush plié at the end, and he is a dependable, attentive partner (he danced here with the lovely but somewhat miscast Kathryn Morgan).

Chase Finlay, a member of the corps of New York City Ballet. Photo by Paul Kolnik.

This is one of his very first featured roles, and he acquitted himself admirably.

In the end, Martins’ “Mirage,” is exactly that, an elegant mirage of a ballet that seems to lack a solid core. It proceeds handsomely, skillfully, but leaves few images or sensations in its wake. The one impression that remains on the eye is  a manoeuver that occurs first at the end of a pas de deux (performed by Morgan and Finlay) and returns at the end of the piece, multiplied across the cast: she stands in arabesque, facing the audience, one leg extended back and arms stretched outward like blades; then he flips her over so that her torso faces upward, now with the leg extended above her. (You can see the final tableau in the photograph at the top of the page.) What does it mean? Who knows, but it’s a strange and arresting image.

The other ballets on the program were “Prodigal Son” and “The Concert,” by Balanchine and Robbins. Daniel Ulbricht’s “Prodigal” is physical and boyish—he is all eagerness and bluster, with little thinking involved. His desolation at the end is that of a person who does not understand, can never understand, what has happened to him. “The Concert” was, frankly, hilarious; every joke came through. The “mistake waltz,” in which the girls of the corps just can’t get themselves organized, had the audience in stitches. And to top it off, Sterling Hyltin was ravishing, a born comedienne in the body of a ballerina who can not make anything look ugly or awkward. This was no mirage.

(You can hear Hyltin talk about “The Concert” in this video.)

Sterling Hyltin and Robert Fairchild in Balanchine's "Stravinsky Violin Concerto." Photo by Paul Kolnik.