San Diego Ballet’s artistic director Javier Velasco has two things in common with French artists Edgar Degas and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec: an affinity for the City of Light and a passion for creating work inspired by dancers.
For next weekend’s “I Love Paris,” the final show in a series of ballet concerts celebrating the San Diego Museum of Art’s centennial, the theme is Impressionism. Works from the museum’s collection, including Degas’ “The Ballerina” and Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful depictions of Parisian dancers, catalyzed Velasco’s choreography.
Degas is known for depicting ballet dancers in a behind-the-scenes way, at rehearsals or backstage, paintings that suggest the reality of their difficult lives.
But Velasco points out that his gauzy artworks, with their nearly blended pastel hues, are more of an exploration of color and light.
San Diego Ballet dancer Jessica Conniff will perform in the company’s spring dance concert “Impressionism: I Love Paris” at the San Diego Museum of Art, May 22-24. (Canela Photography)
“Impressionism is about movement and color, both in music and in art,” Velasco said. “You’re dealing with light and energy and that’s the focus. The subject becomes the artist’s tool.”
Velasco chose the sensual music of Impressionistic composer Claude Debussy’s “Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun” to create a pas de deux that pays tribute to the beauty of the human body.
The tentative, repeating melody was based on a poem about a faun who becomes emotionally stirred by a group of young girls as he awakens from his afternoon nap.
“I like that piece because it has the quality of a very hot afternoon, where you push your body to move,” Velasco described. “There’s a weight to it and the movement is very sculptural — you’re using human flesh as clay and it is erotic. The presentation of it is very modern. It’s about a young man who is involved with his own beauty, and he has an encounter with a young lady, who is more involved with her beauty.”
Songs from the swinging compilation album “A Bachelor in Paris” accompany another ballet work.
French painter Edgar Degas’ 1876 work “The Ballerina” is the inspiration for a dance work in San Diego Ballet’s upcoming “I Love Paris” dance concert. (San Diego Museum of Art, purchase through the Earle W. Grant Acquisition Fund, 1976)
Released on Capitol Records in 1996, the disc includes tracks such as “C’est Magnifique” by Nelson Riddle and his Orchestra and a horn-driven “La Vie en Rose” by Sam Butera and The Witnesses.
“It’s all of these songs that you associate with Paris, but they aren’t highbrow, or played in the way that you are used to hearing them,” Velasco explained. “I love the version of ‘La Vie en Rose’ and I had a blast putting it together.”
The ballet will be performed against a backdrop of posters created by Toulouse-Lautrec, who famously captured can-can dancers with their black stockings, towering headpieces and voluminous petticoats.
“There’s a can-can in it,” Velasco revealed. “But it’s an inverted can-can. It’s not just a bunch of girls in a line kicking — it’s a large group piece and it’s going to be a lot of fun.”
The concert also includes “Water Lilies” by choreographer and former San Diego Dance Theater artistic director Jean Isaacs.
“I went to see a retrospective of her work earlier this year and I asked her if we could perform that piece in this concert,” Velasco said. “It was based on Claude Monet’s ‘Water Lilies,’ and it used Impressionistic music. I thought it would fit really well into our concert because the museum just had a Monet acquisition. I spoke with Jean and she’s having one of her dancers, Blythe Barton, come in and she will be in the piece and set it on the company.”
Velasco visited Paris in 2008 and found the city to be an “enchanting, romantic hub.”
He remembered the tree-lined boulevards and drifting along the Seine River. He recalled a floor show at the former Lido de Paris cabaret on the Champs-Élysées and wondered at the immensity of the Eiffel Tower.
“For ‘I Love Paris,’ I wanted to go with an uplifting feeling,” Velasco said. “That’s what this ballet is about. It says — let’s live in this moment of delight.”
San Diego Ballet presents ‘I Love Paris’
When: 7 p.m. Friday, May 22; 8 p.m. Saturday[, May 23; 2 p.m. next Sunday, May 24
Where: San Diego Museum of Art, James S. Copley Auditorium, 1450 El Prado, San Diego
Tickets: $45-$65
Online: sandiegoballet.org