This personal reflection is part of a series called The Big Ideas, in which writers respond to a single question: What is history? You can read more by visiting The Big Ideas series page.
“Why isn’t Eva Perón blond?”
A New York City audience member asked me this question during a post-performance Q&A for “Doña Perón,” a work I created for Ballet Hispánico. It wasn’t the first time I’d been asked about the historical accuracy of my ballets. Dandara Veiga was the dancer performing the leading role of Evita, the famously blond wife of the 20th-century Argentine president Juan Perón. Veiga is a Black woman with dark hair.
Historical accuracy, or merely replicating facts, has never been the objective of my ballets. It was obvious to me why Evita wasn’t performed by a blond dancer. I cast the dancer who best expressed the essence of the historical Evita, not the one who matched her hair or skin color. Veiga captured Evita’s strong and ambitious exterior along with her inner insecurity and rage over never being accepted by the upper class.
I believe ballet shouldn’t try to be a dispassionate factual narration of events in sequential order. Ballet is an artistic expression, not a documentary. It has the power to intensify, magnify or even exaggerate reality. Ballet offers a creative freedom that allows us to re-examine history and explore new ways of using movement as a form of storytelling.
About 10 years ago, I created my first ballet about a historical figure. I’ve been hooked on finding ways to convey history through dance ever since. In addition to my ballet on Eva Perón, I’ve originated five more narrative ballets about historical figures: the fashion designer Coco Chanel, the opera singer Maria Callas, the poet Delmira Agustini and the artists Frida Kahlo and Fernando Botero. I recently worked out a new version of “Carmen” for Miami City Ballet, based loosely on Molly Bloom, who was indicted by the F.B.I. for organizing underground poker games in the 2000s.
Historical figures are more challenging to portray than fictional characters; you can effortlessly twist and bend fictional characters to fit into the perfect archetypes of a well-constructed piece of art. Closely examining the life of an acclaimed person in real life gives me greater insight into the intricacies of humankind. I feel it is time to bring new stories that reflect the complexities of humans into ballet.
With my work, I’m not deliberately diverging from history, but I like to poeticize events. Artistic imagery allows me to humanize and connect these events directly to modern-day audiences. For example, the opera singer Maria Callas once said that she felt there were two people within her. On one hand, she was Callas, a gifted artist with an amazing voice. But inside, she was yearning to be Maria, the private woman. To portray this idea, I cast two dancers to play the role: one was Maria, and the other played her voice, Callas. I imagined the burden of responsibility that comes with being a revered opera star, so I had the dancer who played her voice push a giant marble head of a Greek goddess slowly and achingly across the stage in a Sisyphean manner.
I’m drawn to trailblazers and unruly women who fought for acceptance and freedom of expression. Researching the lives of these icons is an opportunity to learn about women’s paths to emancipation at different moments in history.
When I base a ballet on a real figure, I become a detective digging into the smallest details that could give me insight into the psyche of a legend. This happened when I visited Casa Azul, the house where Frida Kahlo spent most of her life. Experiencing the place titillated my imagination and provided essential inspiration for my ballet. Exploration like this gives me a certain understanding of someone’s actions, and maybe even a glimpse into their thought processes. I’m intrigued by the details that might unveil someone’s deepest fears and biggest desires.
This raises the question: Is the truth about a historical event or person subject to the perspective through which it is seen or experienced? Since I am a choreographer, this idea might imply that the action is seen solely through my eyes. But this is not entirely correct. The art form of dance is extremely fluid. Once a work is choreographed, it’s then open to multiple levels of interpretation — from the choreographer to the performers, and subsequently, from the performers to the viewers. Overall, it’s a process that can lead to many different meanings.
When I choreograph, I try to put myself into the protagonist’s body and mind. I imagine how their energy translates into movements. In the process of teaching and conveying these ideas and movements to dancers, my own physicality gets automatically diluted through the dancer performing the part. The music added to the dance also affects the emotional reaction to it. Plus, there is a big factor in the performance that I don’t control: the perspective of the audience.
In February, I was seated next to a couple in Phoenix during my ballet “Frida.” In the second act, a dancer representing Kahlo’s painting “The Broken Column” is onstage. The dancer walked slowly toward the audience during the guitar intro of Chavela Vargas’s song “Que Te Vaya Bonito.” When the woman next to me heard the song’s first words, she broke down in sobs. Her husband hugged her very tightly as they watched that one scene. I’ll never know why that particular moment moved her so deeply and acutely. But that’s part of the beauty of art. We all glean unique experiences from a piece.
This is similar to the beauty of history. There are infinitely many details and lessons to discover. What we choose to highlight — and ultimately, to take away — is different for everyone. Dance is my lens for examining pioneering female figures in history, and I have the artistic freedom to reinterpret the past and share new stories. Yet, that is only the first step. When the music starts and the dance begins, what else will come to light?
Annabelle Lopez Ochoa is a Belgian-Colombian choreographer who has created over 100 works for more than 80 dance companies worldwide.
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