Former Georgian Bolshoi ballerina Nina Ananiashvili is hosting the fifth annual Tbilisi Ballet Festival from June 22 to June 30 with the addition of numerous international dancers.
Since 2017, Nina has consecutively been running the international festival, with just a three-year break due to COVID-19. The event will host globally renowned ballet stars this year, as well as the State Ballet of Georgia ballet company and the orchestra from the Tbilisi Opera House. The festival will take place at the Z. Paliashvili State Opera and Ballet Theater of Tbilisi. The first two days, June 22 and 23, will commence with contemporary choreography performances.
The ballet company will present the premiere of two one-act ballets to the audience: The ballet Ashes, staged by the Danish choreographer Sebastian Kloborg, while Israeli contemporary choreographer Maria Barrios will stage the ballet Eyeblink, set to the music of Antonio Vivaldi and Astor Piazzolla.
The week will continue on June 25 with the ballet ‘Giselle’ created by Adolphe Adam and led by Daniil Simkin and Maria Kochetkova. On June 28, there will be the ballet ‘La Bayadère’ by Ludwig Minkus, performed by the lead soloist of the State Ballet of Georgia, Nino Samadashvili, and the principal soloist from the Finnish Opera and Ballet Theatre, Michal Krcmár. The libretto, or story, of this ballet, is by Nina Ananiashvili after Sergei Khudekov and Marius Petipa, and there will be excerpts from the legendary Vakhtang Chabukiani’s choreography.
The festival’s final day on June 30, will present a performance of ‘Swan Lake’ featuring the principal dancers from the Royal Ballet in London (Covent Garden), Fumi Kaneko and Vadim Muntagirov. Tickets for the performances are sold individually and can be found online or at the theater’s box office.
The State Ballet of Georgia is participating in many events leading up to the ballet festival later this month. On June 2, the ballet had a rehearsal at the Tbilisi Opera House of the performance, Sagalobeli, a dance that was made to be paired with Georgian folk music. Nina Ananiashvili said it’s one of the company’s signature works.
“This is our trademark. We perform this ballet around the world, and it’s always very successful,” Nina told us before the rehearsal.
The performance lasted around 30 minutes and was wonderfully constructed, with sounds from the Changi Ensemble, Changi being a Georgian string instrument. The piece was choreographed by Ukrainian-born choreographer and former principal dancer of the Bolshoi Ballet, Yuri Possokhov, who used dance to express Georgia through his eyes, in aesthetics, arts, and music.
The ballet showcases the skills of dancers through lifts, pivots, lunges, and other techniques, while incorporating subtle glimpses into traditional Georgian dance. It is wonderfully balanced between group scenes, solos, and pairs, connecting with the audience and allowing them to have a little taste of the culture. This is evident not only through the dance and sounds that are heard throughout the performance, but also through the costumes designed by Anna Kalatozishvili.
Each piece of clothing was vibrant, with rich grays, greens, and browns, bringing autumn in full force to the stage. The designs were simple, yet elegant when paired with the movement of the dancers and the music.
Kalatozishvili has worked for the movie and theater industry for nearly 30 years after she graduated from the Tbilisi State Academy of Arts in Georgia and the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. She said her inspiration always stems from her choreographer, but that she tries to find a focus based on the original material of a piece, such as culture, music, geography, etc.
“This project was especially interesting for me, because I got to work with Possokhov, and it was amazing,” Kalatozishvili told GEORGIA TODAY. “I think my costumes in Sagalobeli reflect the Georgian culture – I always try to make costumes my own way, through my eyes and opinions. When other people see this, I am happy.”
Sagalobeli, translated as ‘Canticle’ or ‘Hymn’, is a one-act ballet specifically created for the State Ballet of Georgia that debuted on February 2, 2008. Last week’s rehearsal of the performance was to prepare dancers for the open-air Yerevan Ballet Festival that they partook in on June 5. There, the State Ballet performed Sagalobeli as a part of their triple bill program.
According to a review written in April 2023 by The New Criterion, a literary-based magazine, after the State Ballet of Georgia performed in New York, this ballet has the potential to be a long-term performing dance.
“The piece is a strong argument in favor of combining neoclassical ballet and traditional styles of dance,” wrote Hilton Kramer Fellow Jane Coombs in her review. “Still fresh after fifteen years, Sagalobeli looks set to become the SBG’s signature piece, their very own Serenade.”
Currently, there are no performances of Sagalobeli scheduled in Tbilisi; the rehearsal was open only for the Friends of the Georgian Ballet.
By Shelbi R. Ankiewicz
