The Providence-based Ballet Rhode Island wants to grow into a “nationally recognized creative force in dance, rooted in Rhode Island,” according to plans it published this month.
Founded in Providence in 1978 as Festival Ballet Providence, the nonprofit is preparing to celebrate its 50th anniversary as a local arts organization.
Morning host Luis Hernandez talked with Ballet RI’s artistic executive director, Kathleen Breen-Combes, about how the company plans to grow.
Interview highlights:
What it means to be ‘nationally recognized’ and how Ballet RI plans to achieve that goal:
Kathleen Breen-Combes: When we say we want to be a nationally recognized creative force in dance that's deeply rooted here in Rhode Island, I don't think of those two things as mutually exclusive. In fact, I think our connection to Rhode Island is part of what can make us distinctive nationally. I think Rhode Island has this really unique creative voice. It's niche, cool, edgy, and that's really what I want our company to be. I want us to be almost like this really unique boutique ballet company, and that's really what this strategic plan is centered around.
I would say this strategic plan is really ambitious, and it builds on the work we've done over the past several years. We've built a really strong organizational foundation, and now we're ready to expand our reach and reputation. And yeah, how do we do that? That's attracting exceptional artists into our state, retaining them, finding ways to make sure that they stay here, investing in the work of our truly brilliant resident choreographer, Yury Yanowsky. I think it's really important that we have to continue to commission important new work. I would love our company to be the company that creates the classics of tomorrow. So that means expanding our repertoire, developing our dancers, strengthening our school, really creating training pathways into a professional career, but also into those people who just turn into audience members and lovers of dance, and then reaching audiences beyond people who would be our traditional ballet audience, and building partnerships is really important as well throughout the state.
How to attract and build an audience in the age of Netflix and TikTok:
Breen-Combes: We are not competing with other arts organizations right now for our audiences; we are competing with that consumer who has the option to stay at home and sit on their device and be on Netflix. And so it's a different competition, and we need to provide an experience for those people, a reason to come out. And I think that's why art right now is more important than ever. Because it's an opportunity to be in a space where you're having a shared live experience watching humanity that will only happen once on stage, and that's unique right now. That wasn't before, and that is really unique, and I think it's really important that we're offering that to our society right now.
Addressing the criticism that ballet is exclusive and not particularly diverse:
Breen-Combes: I think it's fair to say that it was, right? I think there's a lot of things that the ballet world has looked at over the past decade and said, "Hey, you know, if we expect to continue to be relevant, we need to reflect the societies and the audiences that are coming to see us." And as the artistic director, I think of myself as the gatekeeper, and I am responsible for what voices are heard on that stage and what stories we're telling, and I take that responsibility really seriously. And it's important that we are providing a platform for all different voices to be heard. And I would hope that people who have seen the work that we're doing and who have been to our shows feel that it is not an elite art form, and that we are really telling stories of today and sharing those on stage.
On Timothée Chalamet’s recent statements about ballet losing its relevance:
Breen-Combes: You know what they say, “There's no bad publicity.” And, thank you, Timothée Chalamet, for igniting a fire under the arts community to be like, "Hey, we are still here, and we are still relevant, and this is why." And I think we need that. We need that fire to continue, and we need those conversations to continue to happen, especially in the age of AI, in the age of, devices, and kind of really isolated society. I think people are going to more and more continue to turn to art, and that's really important for us to be there for them.
On what to expect from Ballet RI’s first program of the season
Breen-Combes: We are partnering with the Holocaust Education Center, and we are bringing to life a story of a local second-generation survivor, Lilliane Birch, the story of her mother, Anka Nachtigal. And our resident choreographer, Yury Yanowsky, is partnering with her. It's not a narrative of her life, I would say, but it's really bringing about the themes of small acts of kindness having a massive influence on somebody's life. So we're partnering that world premiere with a choreography by an American Ballet Theatre principal, James Whiteside, along with another piece that we did last year in collaboration with the Westerly Museum of American Impressionism Art. So a really well-rounded program, kind of continuing that idea of partnerships. And it's going to be a really great evening of dance.
