Ballez - Wikipedia

Ballez
General information
Name	Ballez
Year founded	2011
Principal venue	Brooklyn Arts Exchange Brooklyn, New York City New York, U.S.
Website	Ballez
Artistic staff
Artistic Director	Katy Pyle

Ballez is an American ballet company based in New York City. The company re-stages classical works and produces original ballets to emphasize LGBTQ representation in ballet.

History

[edit]

Ballez was founded in 2011 by Katy Pyle, a lesbian and genderqueer dancer, with a focus on creating possibilities, representation, and inclusion for queer dancers within the patriarchal structure of ballet.^[1]^[2]^[3] The creation of Ballez was funded by a grant from the Brooklyn Arts Exchange and was originally an outreach program to provide ballet classes to LGBTQ people that felt disenfranchised in traditional classical dance settings.^[4]^[5] The company aims to portray and include lesbian, gay, transgender, and queer people in ballet through their performances, public engagement programs, and classes that are open to the public.^[6]

Original takes on classical and story ballets that the company has performed include The Firebird, a Ballez, featuring a lesbian princess and a transgender prince, at Dancespace Project in 2013, Variations on Virtuosity, a Gala with the Stars of the Ballez at American Realness at Abrons Arts Center in 2015, and Sleeping Beauty & the Beast, based on historic events in queer history from the 1982 garment workers' strike to the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s and 1990s, at La Mama in 2016.^[7]^[8]^[9]^[10]^[11] Other original works by the company include Slavic Goddess, which was a collaboration with Paulina Olowska in 2017, and a pas de deux for Kyong H. Park's PILLOWTALK in 2018.^[6] In June 2020 the company is scheduled to perform Giselle of Loneliness, a modern take on the classical ballet Giselle where the title character is a gender non-conforming lesbian.^[12]^[13]

Ballez hosts open adult ballet classes at the Brooklyn Arts Exchange^[6]^[14] The company offers free YouTube videos of ballet class for people who are not able to take class in New York.^[12]

References

[edit]

^ "Mission". www.ballez.org.
^ "Katy Pyle, Ballez, and the Virtuosity of the Queer Body". Culturebot. 15 September 2015.
^ Kourlas, Gia (20 April 2016). "Katy Pyle and Her 'Misfits of Ballet'". The New York Times.
^ Kravitz, Melissa (29 June 2018). "Inside the Movement to Make Ballet a More LGBTQ-Inclusive Space". Cosmopolitan.
^ Stake, Kristen (May 2018). "Lez Dance — Ballez Artistic Director Katy Pyle on queering ballet vocabulary in Maine". The Portland Phoenix.
^ ^a ^b ^c "Company".
^ "Katy Pyle Makes Ballez: Re-imagining "The Firebird"". www.dance-enthusiast.com.
^ Spurbeck, Elizabeth (18 August 2017). "Ballez Blazes New Path for the Diverse Future of Ballet". The Official Publication of the World of Dance Community.
^ "THE FIREBIRD, a Ballez - Katy Pyle". cargocollective.com.
^ "The Ballez - American Realness".
^ "Ballez - "Sleeping Beauty & the Beast"". 14 March 2016.
^ ^a ^b "This Queer Ballet Company Is Putting Their Classes Online For Everyone". them. 22 April 2019.
^ "Katy Pyle Is Queering Up the Ballet Canon with Her Ballez". Dance Magazine. 21 March 2018.
^ lsheridan (17 March 2017). "Dance = Freedom: Ballez with Katy Pyle". BRIC.

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North America	Alabama Ballet Alberta Ballet Company Alexandra Ballet Alonzo King LINES Ballet American Ballet Theatre American Midwest Ballet American Repertory Ballet Anaheim Ballet Aspen Santa Fe Ballet Atlanta Ballet Atlanta Festival Ballet Ballet Arizona Ballet Austin Ballet BC Ballet Des Moines Ballet Fantastique Ballet Hispanico Ballet Magnificat! Ballet Memphis BalletMet Ballet Minnesota Ballet Quad Cities Ballet San Jose Ballet Theatre of Maryland Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo Ballet West Ballez Bay Pointe Ballet Boston Ballet Les Grands Ballets Canadiens California Riverside Ballet Carolina Ballet Charlotte Ballet Chicago Ballet Chicago Festival Ballet Cincinnati Ballet Cleveland Ballet (1935 · 1972 · 2014) Colorado Ballet Complexions Contemporary Ballet Cuban National Ballet Dance Theatre of Harlem Dayton Ballet Greensboro Ballet Houston Ballet Joffrey Ballet Kansas City Ballet Los Angeles Ballet Louisville Ballet Moscow Ballet (United States) National Ballet of Canada National Ballet Theater of Puerto Rico New Jersey Ballet New York City Ballet Oklahoma City Ballet Oregon Ballet Theatre Pacific Northwest Ballet Pennsylvania Ballet Pittsburgh Ballet Royal Winnipeg Ballet San Francisco Ballet The Washington Ballet Tulsa Ballet Wonderbound
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South America	Ballet Municipal de Lima Chilean National Ballet Colon Theater Ballet National Ballet of Uruguay

History

References

Further reading