Word: folklorico
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...City sits upon a reclaimed lake, and for centuries it has slowly been sinking into the spongy soil. Buildings along the same block often settle at differing speeds, and streets also sink at random. The famed Palacio de Bellas Artes, where American tourists fight for tickets to the Ballet Folklorico, has dropped nine feet since it was completed in 1934. Considering its flimsy underpinnings, Mexico City is a particularly treacherous locale in which to construct a subway...
...successful-the cowboy ballets of Agnes de Mille, for example, or the large-scale ethnic dance companies sent around the world with in creasing frequency by almost any nation anxious to make its own culture known. One of the most dazzling of these troupes is Mexico's Ballet Folklorico, which just completed its seventh U.S. tour with a one-week stand at Manhattan's City Center. Once again it convinced audiences that hybrid artistry can create a language...
Founded in 1952 by Amalia Hernandez, a former dancer who remains its director and sole choreographer, the Folklorico fills the stage and the eye with the splendor of a national heritage that is a blend of Indian and Spanish elements. The company's lavish costumes, liberally splashed with gold and feathered beyond a peacock's fondest hopes, would stun the senses even if they were worn by mannequins. The 90 traveling members of the troupe-dancers, singers and instrumentalists-are considerably more than that...
...Folklorico's 55 dancers came to the company only after training in the disciplines of classic ballet, whereupon they went on to unlearn many of its basics. Their movements forsake the glide-and-leap patterns of ballet in favor of a staccato stomping in which the heel, rather than the toe, becomes the pivot for the action. Unlike Russia's Moiseyev folk ballet, whose dancers' athletic leaps are relatively close to the virtuoso tradition of formal dance, the Folklorico's characteristic moments find the troupe bouncing in position like so many bright-colored jumping beans...
...home in Mexico City's lavish Palacio de Bellas Artes, the Folklorico draws capacity audiences that manifest lively interest in their country's cultural past. On its worldwide tours, the company serves as a colorful reminder of the surprising glories that can stem from artistic and cultural impurity...