Arthur mitchell dancer biography
Arthur mitchell dancer new york
Dance theatre of harlem...
Remembering Arthur Mitchell, the Barrier-Breaking Black Ballet Dancer
When “Agon” the trailblazing contemporary ballet by master choreographer George Balanchine premiered in 1957, it wasn't only the performance's demanding choreography that shocked audiences.
Balanchine’s central pas-de-deux in the ballet was crafted especially for two leading dancers at the New York City Ballet: Diane Adams and Arthur Mitchell. Adams was white.
Arthur mitchell dancer biography
Mitchell was black. In those early years of the Civil Rights Movement, the pairing was scandalous.
“Can you imagine the audacity to take an African-American and Diana Adams, the essence and purity of Caucasian dance, and to put them together on the stage?” Mitchell recalled earlier this year, in an interview with Gia Kourlas of the New York Times.
“Everybody was against [Balanchine].”
Later footage of the sparse, yet complex ballet (which the New York Times’ dance critic at the time noted was “about as difficult a work as any that has yet been produ