Ballet Quotes - Page 28

• Ballet really lends itself to that because there's such a sense of ritual, with wrapping the shoes every day and preparing new shoes for every performance. It's such a process. It's almost religious, in nature.

  Natalie Portman

  Religious, New Shoes, Process

  Source: collider.com

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• The simplest comment on my book came from my ballet teacher. She said, "I wish you hadn't made every line funny. It's so depressing."

  Quentin Crisp

  Teacher, Depressing, Book

  "The Naked Civil Servant". Book by Quentin Crisp, 1968.

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• Ballet is the repetitive training of the body for the purpose of executing steps in traditional fashion. It is tied to and bound by the past. It is a disciplined beauty consciously preserved in the image of the old days in societies that were class-conscious and appreciative of elitist physical expertise.

  Shirley MacLaine

  Fashion, Past, Class

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• I tell you, the arts - and especially ballet - the discipline is extraordinary. I was extremely impressed.

  Dwayne Johnson

  Art, Discipline, Extraordinary

  "The Game Plan - Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson interview". Interview with Rob Carnevale, www.indielondon.co.uk.

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• It's hard with ballet because your aesthetic really is important. It's different from acting and from film. Nobody wants to watch somebody who is sickly thin. And it's interesting because I have danced with people who are ill, have eating disorders, and a light goes off within them.

  Amanda Schull

  Light, Interesting, People

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• Ballet is the body rising. Ballet is ceremonial and hieratic. Its disdain for the commonplace material world is the source of its authority and glamour.

  Camille Paglia

  Rising, World, Body

  Camille Paglia (1990). “Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson”, Vintage

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• I was embarrassed that I even wanted to become an actress because coming from L.A., with two older sisters in the business and a mom who had been a ballet dancer, it was such a cliche.

  Elizabeth Olsen

  Mom, Two, Dancer

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• With classical ballet you are literally injuring yourself.

  Marina Abramovic

  "Marina AbramoviÄ?, Immaterial Girl". Interview with Gerry Visco, www.interviewmagazine.com. May 29, 2013.

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• And in between the two, in between the sky and the sea, were all the winds. And there were all the nights and all the moons. To be a castaway is to be a point perpetually at the centre of a circle. However much things may appear to change-the sea may shift from whisper to rage, the sky might go from fresh blue to blinding white to darkest black-the geometry never changes. Your gaze is always a radius. The circumference is ever great. In fact, the circles multiply. To be a castaway is to be caught in a harrowing ballet of circles.

  Yann Martel

  Moon, Night, Blue

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• I had seen the ballet of Swan Lake as a child but it was as an adult, when I saw a production featuring Erik Bruhn, that I first noticed how significant a part the ever-present threat of violence played. This juxtaposition of great beauty and grace with a backdrop of pure evil stayed with me for years.

  Walter Dean Myers

  Children, Lakes, Swans

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• Slashing its way to the finish line, Black Swan is the first ballet movie for highbrow horror fans for whom ballet itself signifies little to nothing. Those of us who know and love ballet can only look on it with a different kind of horror.

  James Wolcott

  Swans, Black, And Love

  "Swan Down: James Wolcott's Review". "Opera Chic" blog, December 06, 2010.

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• That kind of friendship doesn't just materialize at the end of the rainbow one morning in a soft-focus Hollywood haze. For it to last this long, and at such close quarters, some serious work had gone into it. Ask any ice-skater or ballet dancer or show jumper, anyone who lives by beautiful moving things: nothing takes as much work as effortlessness.

  Tana French

  Beautiful, Morning, Moving

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• I did ballet, jazz and flamenco from when I was five years old. And my professional career started with dancing in musicals.

  Jennifer Lopez

  Years, Careers, Dancing

  "Jennifer Lopez talks Shall We Dance?". Interview with Brian B., movieweb.com. October 13, 2004.

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• I actually was a ballet dancer - I studied ballet from three until 13 - but like very seriously, that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a contemporary ballet dancer. I wanted to go to Juilliard.

  Solange Knowles

  Dancer, Three, Juilliard

  "Solange Knowles On Nas, Juvenile And Dance Moves". "Microphone Check" with Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Frannie Kelley, www.npr.org. February 12, 2014.

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• Every girl - and boy, if you so choose - should take some ballet. Because ballet gives you grace. It gives you [the ability] to work with your hands. It's all about your hands.

  Stevie Nicks

  Girl, Boys, Hands

  "Stevie Nicks: 'When We Walk Into The Room, We Have To Float In Like Goddesses'". Interview with Ann Powers, www.npr.org. March 17, 2013.

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• I can always invent movement, and sometimes it can be fitted into the right place, but that is not choreography. It is the music that dictates the whole shape of the work. I do not believe in the permanence of anything in ballet save the purely classical.

  George Balanchine

  Believe, Movement, Shapes

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