Last edition, we heard from Queensland Ballet Academy Artistic Director Christian Tàtchev about the crisis affecting the future of ballet being seen in our training institutions – a shortage of boys. Queensland Ballet has launched its own The Boys Ballet Project to combat this, and you can read about that in this article here.
But now, we return to Tàtchev and find out why male ballet is so much more than men in tights and discover why we as a society have to help build a safer space for young boys to choose to dance and be celebrated for it.
Why do you think this lack of male interest in ballet is happening at the moment?
“There is a wider discussion about Australian culture, about boys doing ballet to start with. For a long time, I thought it was the fathers or mothers who didn’t want their boys to do it, and there’s the other dynamic that could be the girl in the class was just saying to the boy, ‘What are you doing in my ballet class?’ So, there is a cultural discussion that does need to happen on a much greater scale.
If you think of ballet in the past, it was very much female-specific – lots of swans and one Prince, but we are not living in those times; we’re not telling those stories as often anymore. The dancers are dynamic. They’re elite athletes. They’re fit, they cross-train. The industry has changed. The perception of what ballet is for a man hasn’t evolved, but the industry has.”
Let’s talk about those stories. There’s lots of new work, and it isn’t just about male and female partnering and supporting roles for men.
“Life today and the work created today are based on contemporary times. Pas de deux is not just about the male and the female dancer now. It could be two males, it could be two females. We’re telling different stories, and that’s reflected in the choreography.
But also the need of the choreographer today is to have a fast, fit, dynamic dancer who is equal to an elite athlete. This is also how we train them. This is how we look after them from a health perspective because we know so much more about dance now that we actually look at the science behind the dancer’s body. When I was training, I wasn’t allowed to go to the gym, I wasn’t allowed to cycle, to run, to ski. I wasn’t allowed to do anything that was going to develop what was then considered the wrong muscle, that would alter what the perception of a dancer’s body should look like, or that might give me an injury. Now, we actually encourage that cross-training because it eliminates injuries and makes the dancer more versatile and ready for what the choreographer needs today. The choreography is different. The world is different. And the industry has responded. The industry has evolved and updated its practice. This is reflected in our training, in our repertoire. I wonder how long it will take until perception will change.”
For some young boys, the idea of wearing tights is uncomfortable. Should we be getting them through the doors and making them fall in love with the artform first before worrying about what they’re wearing?
“Yes, I completely agree. This is what we have done with The Boys Ballet Project. We’ve said no uniforms; we remove the barriers to just get them in the room to show them that it could be fun. It could be physical. It could be engaging. And they get to meet with other boys who are also passionate about ballet. The bullying is a big thing in Australia in terms of boys who do ballet. So, we want to get them together to form those connections. Australia is so big on ‘mateship’. We need to get that going and once they’re together they will be the ones changing the culture later, even if they don’t end up being a dancer.
The tights comment still surprises me because look at cycling uniforms, look at the Olympics, this is what everyone is doing now because they’ve identified that it’s actually more practical to wear to do physical movement. But I do think we need to remove the barriers when they are young, and if they later choose to do ballet, they’ll realise that.”
Male dancers often talk about a mother who was a ballet teacher or a sister who went to ballet class. Should studio owners be looking at ways to capitalise on male siblings to encourage more boys in their studio?
“Yes. If they can have once a week, once a month or every couple of weeks, an opportunity to get those brothers to come in, to give them a class. It doesn’t have to be ballet either. Just show them that dance is fun. To show them that being together is fun. To show them that it is physical and that they’ll get as much enjoyment out of it as they could sport.”
Is there an age when boys tend to quit ballet?
“We are affiliated with Kelvin Grove College and they have a lot of younger boys in dance and then something happens around year 5 or 6 where they just go into sports. They just stop coming in year 7. And then by the time they’re brave again, around 14 and 15, and want to come back to ballet, it’s often harder.”
What other barriers are there for male dancers?
“We actually lose a lot of male talent over fees. Again, talking about scholarships and funding. Going overseas is sometimes cheaper than travelling to study interstate or even just in another city because of the bursaries and financial support that bigger training institutions overseas can offer. I think it’s a shame that we are losing talent in this way. We need to be telling people the success stories of our training institutions because they are just as good and you don’t have to leave at all to receive a quality education.”
You mentioned scholarships. Is this an important strategy, do you think?
“The cost of training a ballet dancer in Australia is very high in comparison to European countries. So, yes.”
Bringing boys together can be a costly exercise. How important is it to provide opportunities for often solo boys in studio classes to come together?
“That’s exactly right. For this project, I hadn’t even thought about it [the cost]. It wasn’t negotiable. It just needed to happen. We just needed to make it work .”
Australian male ballet dancers have spoken publicly about having to make a choice between sport and ballet. Do you think this is a contributing factor to the decline?
“We’ve had boys who were young who have stopped coming to us because they wanted to focus on sports and then they later come back to us because they realise this is what they prefer more. But the discussion has been around peer pressure or bullying or just making a decision about sports because they want to stay with their mates. I think it’s a crossroads when you have to make that decision and you have to make that decision later as well in dance about whether you stay in classical ballet or go into another dance genre. Those crossroads happen in life often. But the key is that time when the decision has to be made and if that young boy doesn’t have the support of his family or his peers, unless they feel they have to dance, it’s really hard to make that choice.”
What can we be doing to help boys make those connections and find that support so ultimately they do choose ballet at those crux moments?
“I think we need to offer much more exposure and education around that. Queensland Ballet is planning something like a Q&A with industry experts very soon, that are boy-specific. To tell the stories and the successes of the male dancers and share that you can travel the world and experience different things that might lead you to another career later. We need to show the physicality, show the training component and have interactive sessions.
For a number of years, we’ve had companion strategies. We show a lot of male dancers on our social media and a lot of people hadn’t even noticed. We need to provide more access, more opportunities and tell male dancer stories as often as we can. I’d like to see more interest from the people who can have an impact. The mainstream media and the Government influence that space. Where is the education in schools about ballet or the arts in general? Where is the arts section on the news?”
Over the years, there have been many attempts to secure more ballet boys in training. It feels like a constant battle. With choreographers taking on more male-dominated storylines like Spartacus, and more contemporary storylines like Touché by Christopher Rudd bringing together two males for a romantic pas de deux, or the recent production of Oscar based on the life of Oscar Wilde by The Australian Ballet. As Tàtchev says, the ballet world has evolved. The roles await.
So then, how do we now ensure that our ballet boys, and men, feel supported to step out from behind the ballerina? How do we encourage mainstream media and the broader community to celebrate them as we do in the industry? And how do we encourage young boys to aspire to be them and take those first steps in the studio in the first place?
How do we win the coin toss when it comes to decisions over sport and dance at that crux age? And how do we secure the funds necessary to remove any and all barriers to participation?
Programs like The Ballet Project at Queensland Ballet are vital when trying to answer all these questions. Students can register for The Ballet Boys Project classes here.
By Nichola Hall of Dance Informa.
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