Ballet

Ballet /ˈbæleɪ/ (French: [balɛ]) is a type of performance dance that originated in the Italian Renaissance courts of the 15th century and later developed into a concert dance form in France and Russia. It has since become a widespread, highly technical form of dance with its own vocabulary based on French terminology. It has been globally influential and has defined the foundational techniques used in many other dance genres. Becoming a ballet dancer requires years of training. Ballet has been taught in various schools around the world, which have historically incorporated their own cultures to evolve the art.

Ballet may also refer to a ballet dance work, which consists of the choreography and music for a ballet production. A well-known example of this is The Nutcracker, a two-act ballet that was originally choreographed by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov with a music score by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Ballets are choreographed and performed by trained artists. Many classical ballets are performed with classical music accompaniment and use elaborate costumes and staging, though there are exceptions to this. Most notably, American choreographer George Balanchine is known for his plotless neoclassical ballets which are often performed in simple leotards and tights without scenery.

Ballet (film)

Ballet is a 1995 American documentary film directed by Frederick Wiseman. It portrays rehearsals, choreography, performances, business transactions, and other day-to-day life of the American Ballet Theatre. Much of the footage dates from the 1992 season. It also includes scenes from the company's European tour, namely in Greece and Copenhagen.

Appearances are made by Susan Jaffe, Julie Kent, Julio Bocca, Angel Corella, Amanda McKerrow, Alessandra Ferri and others. Various ballet masters and choreographers also appear, including Kevin McKenzie, ABT's artistic director, Ulysses Dove, Irina Kolpakova, Natalia Makarova and Agnes de Mille. Business transactions by then-director Jane Hermann are also included.

The film is currently released to the public by Wiseman's distribution company, Zipporah Films

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Ballet (music)

Ballet as a music form progressed from simply a complement to dance, to a concrete compositional form that often had as much value as the dance that went along with it. The dance form, originating in France during the 17th century, began as a theatrical dance. It was not until the 19th century that ballet gained status as a “classical” form. In ballet, the terms ‘classical’ and ‘romantic’ are chronologically reversed from musical usage. Thus, the 19th century classical period in ballet coincided with the 19th century Romantic era in Music. Ballet music composers from the 17th–19th centuries, including the likes of Jean-Baptiste Lully and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, were predominantly in France and Russia. Yet with the increased international notoriety seen in Tchaikovsky’s lifetime, ballet music composition and ballet in general spread across the western world.

History

Until about the second half of the 19th century the role of music in ballet was secondary, with the main emphasis on dance, while music was simply a compilation of danceable tunes. Writing "ballet music" used to be a job for musical craftsmen, rather than for masters. For example, critics of the Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky mentioned his writing of ballet music as something demeaning.

Veganism

Veganism is both the practice of abstaining from the use of animal products, particularly in diet, and an associated philosophy that rejects the commodity status of animals. A follower of veganism is known as a vegan.

Distinctions are sometimes made between several categories of veganism. Dietary vegans (or strict vegetarians) refrain from consuming animal products, not only meat but also eggs, dairy products and other animal-derived substances. The term ethical vegan is often applied to those who not only follow a vegan diet but extend the philosophy into other areas of their lives, and oppose the use of animal products for any purpose. Another term is environmental veganism, which refers to the avoidance of animal products on the premise that the harvesting or industrial farming of animals is environmentally damaging and unsustainable.

The term vegan was coined in 1944 by Donald Watson when he co-founded the Vegan Society in England, at first to mean "non-dairy vegetarian" and later "the doctrine that man should live without exploiting animals." Interest in veganism increased in the 2010s; vegan stores opened, and vegan options became available in more supermarkets and restaurants in many countries.

Vegetarianism and wine

Wine is sometimes finished with animal products. Specifically, finings used to remove organic impurities and improve clarity and flavour include several animal products, including casein, albumen, gelatin and isinglass.

Non-vegetarian/vegan additives

Wineries might use animal-derived products as finings. To remove proteins, yeast, and other organic particles which are in suspension during the making of the wine, a fining agent is added to the top of the vat. As it sinks down, the particles adhere to the agent, and are carried out of suspension. None of the fining agent remains in the finished product sold in the bottle, and not all wines are fined.

Examples of animal products used as finings are gelatin, isinglass, chitosan, casein and egg albumen. Bull's blood is also used in some Mediterranean countries but (as a legacy of BSE) is not allowed in the U.S. or the European Union. Kosher wines use isinglass derived from fish bladders, though not from the sturgeon, since the kosher status of this fish is in debate .

Trenton Doyle Hancock

Trenton Doyle Hancock is an American artist. He was born in 1974 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and grew up in Paris, Texas.

Hancock received a BFA from Texas A&M University-Commerce, and an MFA from the Tyler School of Art at Temple University, Philadelphia. Hancock makes prints, drawings, and collaged felt paintings.

The characters which populate his imaginary worlds include the Mounds, half-animal, half-plant creatures, which are preyed upon by evil beings called vegans.

Hancock was included in the American Folk Art Museum's "Dargerism" exhibit, showing the influence of Henry Darger on contemporary artists.

He is represented in New York by James Cohan Gallery and was featured in PBS' Art:21.

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