Unknown portraits of Salvatore Vigano in Bohemian Collections
Salvatore Vigan簷 (1769-1821) is one of the greatest dancers and choreographers of ballet history, creator of the so-called choreodrama, which may be seen as the completion of the artistic plans of J.G.Noverre and G.Angiolini. For two periods (1793-95 and 1799-1803) he worked also in Vienna and impressed together with his wife Marie Medina and later Maria Casentini the contemporary public, among which were also the members of the noble families Schwarzenberg and Waldstein, who had their castles also in Bohemia. Vigan簷 himself danced also in Prague Nosticz Theater in 1795 (two years before W.A. Mozart premiered his Don Giovanni opera there) and maybe also at some other private aristocratic theaters, as we can find four big panels with him dancing at the count Waldsteins private theater at Litomy禳l Castle. Another portrait of him with Maria Medina is located at the esk羸 Krumlov Castle, which belonged to the theater-loving Schwarzenberg family. My paper will introduce those portraits together with the details of research about this personality and his connections to Central European cultural scene.
Helena Kaz獺rov獺 is a Professor at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (AMU) and has been Head of the Department of Dance since 2011. In 1997 she founded the Baroque Dance Ensemble Hartig , whose dancers are mostly former or current students of AMU. Her interests include the history and theory of dance, ballet and dance aesthetics, and she specialises in the reconstruction and revitalisation of dances from written and graphic notation, choreography and movement culture of the eighteenth century. She has danced and created dances, or advised on period movement style and gesture, for numerous performances, including Baroque dances for various music festivals, film and TV, and works by Bononcini, H瓣ndel, and Gluck. She staged the Rococo ballet La guirlande 梗紳釵堯硃紳喧矇梗 of Joseph Starzer in the castle theatres at esk羸 Krumlov and Mnichovo Hradi禳t. Her publications include Barokn穩 tanen穩 formy/Baroque Dance Forms (AMU 2005), and Barokn穩 balet ve stedn穩 Evrop/Baroque Ballet in Central Europe (AMU 2008).