HOMMAGE À SERGE LIFAR

The Dancer, choreographer and, later, the director of the Ballet de L’Opera National de Paris, was not intended to be a dancer at all. Born in Kiev in 1905 to a upper middle class family (his father was an officer in the Army) Serge became – almost by accident – a pupil in the dance studio of Bronislawa Nijinska (sister of the famous dancer Vaslav Nijinski). According to her, Sergei – or later Serge, was not a promising student, but in his late teens S. Diagilev, the head of the Ballet Russe, sent a message to Bronislawa from Paris: “I need five of your best dancers”. A dramatic story followed buying a train ticket to Warsaw – for 30 million rubles – rubles after 1917 had an incredible inflation – Lifar, although having been told to dress up as a Bolshevik militant – was arrested at the Polish border. However, Lifar managed to escape and after a few weeks on the streets of Warsaw, money came from Diagilev in Paris for the ticket. Diagilev took care of Lifar in more than one way. Lifar was taken through the main museums of France and Italy being told that ‘Being a dancer you will need to understand the arts’. Lifar took care of Diagilev during the latter’s last years – and the last years of Ballet Russe while his own reputation as a dancer and choreographer was growing. Lifar became the very first ‘Star Dancer’. A title normally reserved for female dancers, but Lifar moved the of a male dancer from the role of supporter to the ballerina to an equal dancer. 

From H.M. the King of Sweden, Lifar received the Order of Wasa, The Chevalier de la Lègion d’Honnours from Ch. De Gaulle, Commander des Arts des Lettres, the Premiere Chanson d’Or, Medaille d’Or de la Ville de Paris and later also of Lausanne. In Monte Carlo he created the “New Ballet Russe”. Later it was discovered that when receiving the Nazi’s at the front entrence of the Paris Opera, he was smuggling out a few hundred dancers, singers, musicians and workers of Jewish and other “disagreeable nationalities” out the back.

In later life Lifar was very much associated with Madame la Comtessa Lillian Amlefedelt-Laurvig, who, after Lifar’s death, 18^th December 1986, in Lausanne, she created foundations in Lausanne, Switzerland, Vaduz, Lichtenstein and in Kiev, Ukraine, to take care of Lifar’s heritage.

This exhibition is an art-impression of Lifar’s works. It does not follow his life chronological development – it does not show the works in itself but it tries to show the possible ideas behind the works which Lifar created in less tolerant times. Most of the works shows fragments of the stories behind the works that Lifar choreographed – or re-choreographed, but also from other artists works that, to some extent, were inspired by Lifar’s creations.