On walls throughout Russian cities, Swan Lake graffiti has been appearing. These depict the famous line of four ballerinas in the “Dance of the Cygnets” in “Swan Lake” and have become forms of anti-war protest. While this symbol may seem strange, it has existed for many decades already. In 1982, Soviet state TV aired the ballet repeatedly after the death of Premier Brezhnev as Soviet leaders decided on a successor. This happened again after the deaths of Yuri Andropov in 1984 and Konstantin Chernenko in 1985. It also occurred in 1991 after a failed coup against Mikhail Gorbachev, where it officially became a sign of political upheaval. Even before ballet became this political symbol, it was used in political relations as a form of cultural diplomacy, specifically between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Though ballet originated in Italy and France, it was at the Imperial Russian Ballet in St. Petersburg in the late 19th century that it truly developed. Since then, Russia has continued to have a significant influence on ballet around the world. Two of the world’s most prestigious companies, the Mariinsky Ballet and the Bolshoi Ballet, are located in Russia.
Ballet’s role during the Cold War era first came to light in 1954, when President Eisenhower established the President’s Emergency Fund for International Affairs. Part of this fund included $2,250,000 allocated to the State Department to put on art and sports presentations abroad. In 1958, the Lacy-Zarubin agreement was reached. This outlined a two-year plan of reciprocal exchange of art, science, media, and education between the US and the Soviet Union. Initiatives to use ballet for cultural diplomacy were being directly funded by both nations.
In 1960, the United States launched one of its first big initiatives in using ballet for cultural diplomacy: American Ballet Theater’s (ABT’s) Tour of the Soviet Union. Starting in Moscow on September 13, the company performed at the Stanislavsky Theater, rather than the more renowned Bolshoi Theater. This did not, however, prevent their performances from selling out. Influential figures, such as Nikita S. Khrushchev and prima ballerinas Galina Ulanova and Maya Plisetskaya, attended the company’s opening night. After this start in Moscow, ABT then went on to perform in Tbilisi, Georgia and in Leningrad, returning to Moscow on October 21st to conclude their tour. After the final performance, Premier Khrushchev invited ABT to return to the USSR.
Two years later, New York City Ballet (NYCB) followed in ABT’s footsteps, but in an even more complicated context. A week after NYCB’s arrival in Moscow to begin its eight-week tour, funded by the US Department of State, US reconnaissance planes discovered Soviet missiles in Cuba, triggering the Cuban Missile Crisis. Despite the rising tensions between the US and the USSR, NYCB’s performances were met with enthusiasm from Soviet audiences. At one performance, the audience cheered for an encore, leading principal dancer Edward Villella to perform his solo a second time to a standing ovation, even though company policy forbade encores.
NYCB’s tour was especially notable because of the company’s artistic director, George Balanchine. George Balanchine was a Georgian-American ballet choreographer born in Russia, who co-founded NYCB with Lincoln Kirstein in 1948. When the company went to Georgia as part of its USSR tour, few people knew Balanchine by his Georgian last name (Balanchivadze), but his fame had spread from the US to Georgia. He was perfectly positioned to serve as “an artistic U.S. public diplomat.” While the US and USSR each tried to insert their cultural values into their ballets, people in Georgia viewed Balanchine not as an outsider from the other side of the Iron Curtain, but rather as someone who had worked hard to achieve his dreams in a free country. For Balanchine, personally, this was his first time visiting his home country, an experience that both allowed him to connect with his heritage and become inspired by Georgian folk dances for his future choreography.
Stylistically, Balanchine’s choreography was classified as “neoclassical abstract ballet,” something the US feared would not be well received in the Soviet Union, where ballets were typically more traditional. However, Soviet audiences did enjoy these performances. The US had failed to realize that after the death of Stalin, a new generation of artists arose in the USSR, leading to the development of choreographic symphonism. This new type of dance focused on the connection between dance and music, rather than the earlier focus on that between dance, theater, and literature. Choreographic symphonism and Balanchine’s neoclassicism both developed from changes in early 20th-century Russian ballet, revealing similarities between American and Soviet ballet. The successful reception of NYCB in the USSR would later lead to NYCB completing a second tour in the Soviet Union in 1972.
Like the US, the USSR also sent its own ballet companies on tours abroad. In 1959 and 1962, the Bolshoi Ballet toured the US and was received warmly, with performance tickets being resold for the equivalent of $830 in 2018 dollars. In 1957, a year after the Bolshoi Ballet visited the UK, British ballerina Beryl Grey became the first Western dancer to guest with the Soviet company. These exchanges, though they certainly helped humanize both countries, did not come without misunderstandings. The Bolshoi Ballet’s performance of “Spartacus” was not successful amongst American audiences. They did not view it as ballet since dancers wore Roman sandals, instead of pointe shoes. They much preferred to go see the new Hollywood movie called “Spartacus” that had just been released. On the other hand, American choreographers worried that Soviet audiences would be offended by abstract ballets like Balanchine’s “Agon,” not understanding that this neoclassical style was already similar to the Russian creation of choreographic symphonism.
Despite some misunderstandings, these cultural exchanges also ended up providing an unintended opportunity for USSR dancers to defect. In 1961, ballet dancer and choreographer Rudolf Nureyev was one of the first to defect. He was followed by Natalia Makarova in 1970 and Mikhail Baryshnikov in 1974. All three of these dancers were from St. Petersburg—a region in which dancers were far less controlled than in Moscow. In Moscow, teachers were paid to report on dancers, and families were practically held as collateral. One dancer from Moscow’s Bolshoi Ballet who did manage to defect was Alexander Godunov. In 1985, the USSR released a film called “Flight 222” that was connected to his defection.
With today’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine by Russia, many Russian dancers have defected, similar to the Soviet dancers who did so during the Cold War. Most notably, former Bolshoi Ballet soloist Olga Smirnova left Russia ten days after the start of the invasion of Ukraine. When the invasion began, Smirnova wrote, “I’ve always been proud of the talent of the Russian people, of our cultural and sporting achievements. But today, a line has been crossed.” Smirnova is now a prima ballerina with the Dutch National Ballet in Amsterdam.
As with during the Cold War, the ballet community has also had a role in, or at least a reaction to, the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. In March of 2022, international ballet stars took part in a charity gala in London to raise funds for people in Ukraine. This project was led by Ukrainian ballet dancer Ivan Putrov and Romanian ballerina Alina Cojocaru. The organization Youth America Grand Prix, which organizes one of the biggest ballet competitions, has helped almost 100 Ukrainian dance students find placements throughout Europe to continue studying ballet in safer settings. The war also led to the end of any pre-existing partnerships between the US and Russia. For example, the US National Security Language Initiative for Youth program previously had a partnership with the Bolshoi Ballet Academy. In this program, American ballet students had the opportunity to train in Russia, while gaining proficiency in Russian, a language that the US considers critical to its national security. In addition to the loss of US partnerships, the UK tours of the Bolshoi Ballet and the Russian State Ballet of Siberia were canceled when Russia invaded Ukraine.
While it is difficult to see how much of a tangible effect ballet had on political policies, especially that of the USSR, it’s difficult to deny that the art form did help humanize both sides. By seeing Soviet dancers on stage performing just like American dancers, the Soviet Union became less distant to American audiences and likewise to Soviet audiences. These Cold War artistic exchanges helped increase intercultural exchange overall between the US and USSR, something that was able to persist until the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Although cultural exchange between Russia and the United States has decreased recently, ballet still plays a role in other international relations. Ballet has become a universal language that helps build bridges across different cultures, contributing to the formation of positive relations.
Featured/Headline Image Caption and Citation: A group of ballet dancers performing on a stage. Ballet performance don quixote, beauty fashion | Image sourced from Pixabay | CC License, no changes made
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