American Ballet Theatre Dancers by AB+DM for InStyle July 2021
/
The first ‘to do’ in reading ‘Ballet Is Back, Baby’ a fashion story shot by AB+DM for Instyle US and published early June online for the July issue, is to verify the facts. Julia von Boehm styles dancers from American Ballet Theatre in a heady mix of Alexander McQueen, Commando, Dolce & Gabbana, Fendi, Givenchy, JW Anderson, Khaite, Mônot, Spanx,Thom Brown and more./ Hair by Shin Arima; makeup by Frankie Boyd
The Dancers include Isabella Boylston, ABT Principal Dancer; James Whiteside, ABT Principal Dancer; ABT Corp dancers: Anabel Katsnelson, Betsy McBride, Emily Hayes, João Menegussi, Melvin Lawovi and Yoon Jung Seo, ABT Studio Corps.
“Verifying the facts” refers to a bus tour select American Ballet Theatre dancers were scheduled to make across America, as they faced another cancelled official season in 2021. Read all the fashion particulars at InStyle, while we check out the bus tour.
In fact, the #ABTAcrossAmerica US tour did happen — at outside venues and not the predictable ones for a ballet tour. These shots on ABT’s IG — not in geographical order — show the dancers bringing joy to lawn-lovers in Minneapolis, MN; Middleburg, VA; Chicago, MI; Iowa City, IA; Lincoln NE. Other stops included St. Louis, Mo and Charleston, SC. The dancers made it back to New York City for a special closing performance last week, July 21.
The Power of Hope
I’m reading the concept “beacon of hope” for the second time this Wednesday morning. Just posting about Amanda Gorman’s new book of poetry, ‘Call Us What We Carry’, dropping December 7, Gorman said
“I wrote ‘Call Us What We Carry’ as a lyric of hope and healing. I wanted to pen a reckoning with the communal grief wrought by the pandemic. It’s been the hardest thing I’ve ever written, but I knew it had to be. For me, this book is a receptacle, a time capsule both made by and for its era. What is poetry if not a mirror for our present and a message for our future?”
Similarly, American Ballet Theatre has always been a “for the people” dance company, in spite of being headquartered in New York and embodied with that indestructible New York City — that’s ALL of NYC — spirit.
Reflecting on the ABT company and its return to Rockefeller Center last week, this article from Rockefeller Center Magazine resonates:
“Where we play is part of what we become,” wrote former ABT board member Justin S. Collins in the introduction to Inside American Ballet Theatre. When the dancers move across the stage in each city of their new tour, they’ll become a beacon of hope, an embodiment of the return of the performing arts in America. “I think what’s so special is that ABT has always been an institution grounded in New York, headquartered in New York,” Barnett says, “but it belongs to the nation.” And at their final performance under the city lights at Rockefeller Center, they’ll be home, where it all started for ABT.
Related: Photographers AB+DM were featured in the NYT Style Section in late May as The Next Image Makers. Ahmad Barber and Donté Maurice were interviewed with Kennedi Carter and Quil Lemons.
