.jpg)
Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. Vol. 2, No. 1 March 8, 1939
A New Art?
A New Art?
And what is the significance of Ballot as a form of art? Will the artists of the future express their ideals and emotions in the "plastic art of choerography"? It is easy to argue that Ballet makes movement mechanical when it ought to be spontaneous: that the repetition of the routine steps is in direct conflict with the Ideals of artistic expression; that the art is not "plastic" at all. The difficulty of recording the stops and dances in Ballet is at present Insuperable—Nijinsky went mod trying to find a method—and is likely to repel artists who might otherwise turn to choreography.
"The ballet," said Professor Shelley, "like all the arts, is an attempt to escape from the material into the realms of pure expressive rhythm. It is as exquisite as the "Primaverar" of [unclear: Botticelli], as lovely as the flying buttresses of Beauvais, as . . . but what's the use of talking? If architecture is frozen music, the ballet is liquid music, and it escapes the fixed values of words just as its own quintessence of movement escapes the many hundredweights of human flesh and blood which produce it."
The Covent Garden Russian Ballet has come and gone: next year we are told they are returning with—inter alia—"Petrouchka" and "The Fire Bird."
We sincerely hope so.
—R.P. and R.L.M.