“A total addiction and passion
to your work, instinct, and a sense of quality – but heaven forbid not too much.”
This
philosophy of success was revealed by Carel Birnie after he announced his
resignation as managing director of Nederlands Dans Theater in 1991, having
held the position for more than thirty years.[1] During this period Birnie had
achieved some significant goals. He supervised nearly every aspect of business,
was responsible for many important decisions, and was never afraid of provoking
civil servants, or NDT’s board of trustees, to get the best possible outcome
for the company – an attitude which resulted in him being acclaimed the ‘Tsar
of Dance.’[2]
Birnie’s crowning glory
In retrospect, probably the crowning glory of Birnie's stewardship was the opening of the company’s own theatre in 1987. Ever since the NDT’s foundation, Birnie had major plans with regards to housing the company.[3] He believed that a company could only develop itself when it was provided with certain facilities: its own building with studios to practice, lounges for the dancers, separate departments, and, above all, its own theatre. Achieving these goals required great perseverance. It would take Birnie nearly thirty years and many battles with the municipality of The Hague before he was able to open the doors of his own theatre at the Spui square in The Hague - generally referred to as Lucent Dans Theater.[4]
This theatre far exceeded the expectations of those who had experienced the early days of the company. Initially, with no money to rent studio space, the company was forced to practice at different locations throughout The Hague. These included ballet schools after opening hours, basements, old churches, and other abandoned buildings around the city. After the success of the first season, however, the municipality provided NDT with several studios in a monumental 17th century building at the Boterwaag. In 1961, however, NDT was granted the studios that Sonia Gaskell and her Nederlands Ballet had occupied at the Koningstraat 118a. This old primary school, located in the middle of a neighbourhood listed for urban regeneration, was actually too small and decayed to house the company.[5] With several studios added to the building, some rudimentary provision against leakage, a self-built basement, and even an indoor tree, it would, nevertheless, house the company until they moved to the new building.
Lucent Dans Theater
In 1979 Birnie had finally convinced the city council to provide the finance for a building next to the Circustheater in Scheveningen.[6] His ultimate quest, however, for a custom built theatre continued. Birnie had hired the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas and his Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) to design the adaptations to the Circustheater. At the same time, he calculated what the costs were for a new theatre and requested Koolhaas to create a blueprint for this plan. In the end, he convinced the municipality that a new theatre in Scheveningen would be the most economic alternative. While engaged in these discussions, Birnie also secretly negotiated with the Residentie Orkest – who were granted a piece of ground at the Spui square to build their own concert hall, but were short of money to proceed.[7]
Eventually, this collaboration culminated in the opening of Muziektheater aan het Spui; a building that would house both the Residentie Orkest in the Anton Philipszaal, designed by Dick van Mourik and Peter Vemeulen, and Nederlands Dans Theater in Lucent Dans Theater, by Rem Koolhaas. The latter building comprised a large stage designed especially for dance performances: 23 rows with 1001 seats – achieving a balance between optimal acoustics and the best possible sightlines, three large studios, a fitness area which would include a swimming pool and sauna, and offices to house the staff.[8]
After the opening night on September 9, 1987, Lucent Dans Theater was praised for its architectural design and suitability for dance.[9] On this evening the company performed Kylián’s famed ‘Sinfonietta’ (1978) and three premieres, Van Manen’s ‘Wet Desert’, Kylián’s ‘Evening Songs’, and a work created by Kylián ‘Sint Joris Rijdt Uit’ – an allegorical play in which Carel Birnie was depicted as a dangerous, but highly cherished dragon. The variety of artistic collaborations, characterising this particular programme, reveals a continuing trend of this period: the distinct artistic profile of Kylián in conjunction with the eloquent language of the choreographers he attracted to the company.
A new generation of
choreographers
Kylián not only invited Hans van Manen to create ballets, but also Nacho Duato – a dancer of the company who had flourished as a choreographer in creations as ‘Jardi Tancat’ (1983) and ‘Synaphai’ (1986) – and, furthermore, artists less familiar to the company. To a certain extent, those artists slightly shifted the American orientation of the company during the early years of its existence. This was evident, for example, through Mats Ek, whose expressive ballets, relying on theatrical texts and conventions, reached something completely beyond spoken language. He created ‘Memories of Youth’ (1980) and ‘Over There’ (1990), and staged some of his earlier socially engaged pieces: ‘The House of Bernarda Alba’ (1978), ‘Grass’ (1983), and ‘Gamla Barn’ (1989).[10] And Christopher Bruce – who staged his acclaimed ‘Ghost Dances’ (1981) and co-created Jiří Kylián’s ‘Curses and Blessings’ (1983).
Other choreographers introduced to the company were William Forsythe and Ohad Naharin. Forsythe, whose ballets explored conventional limits of ballet and the potential of disruption, was engaged by the company in 1980 and quickly became known as “a journalist who dissects and critiques a topic through movement”.[11] The pieces he created and staged during the eighties were ‘Say Bye-Bye’ (1980), ‘Time Cycle’ (1982), ‘Gänge’ (1982), ‘Lovesongs’ (1983) and ‘Steptext’ (1986). Naharin, who had become renowned during the eighties for his grounded movements and creations where “the human body extends itself beyond familiar limits”,[12] was invited by Kylián in 1987 to create ‘Chameleon Dances’ (1987), ‘Queens of Golub’ (1989), ‘Passomezzo’ (1989), and to stage his ‘Tabula Rasa’ (1983).
Even though these choreographic and architectural developments are just a small part of a much larger anthology, they have left a permanent mark on the company. Lucent Dans Theater had become a place where the above-mentioned choreographers would return to during the eighties and for decades thereafter. It would house the company and its members for over thirty years – notwithstanding the removal of several parts of the building – and would grow into a second home for several generations of dancers. Dancers of this decade which – unmistakably – have felt a sense of belonging were Joke Zijlstra, Marly Knoben, Nora Kimball, Catherine Allard, France Nguyen, Fiona Lummis, Karine Guizzo, Nacho Duato, Glen Eddy, Jim Vincent, Aryeh Weiner and Philip Taylor.
[1]Pieter Kottman, ‘De ‘tsaar van de dans’ Carel Birnie stopt vanwege zijn onwillige lijf.’ NRC Handelsblad, November 20, 1991.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Hans Steketee, ‘Carel Birnie: Dit heb ik mijn leven lang gewild’, NRC Handelsblad, November 3, 1989.
[4] Eva van Schaik, ‘Van bouwval naar paradijs’, Trouw, September 3, 1987.
[5] Kasper Jansen and Jessica Voeten, ‘Zakelijk leider maakt al sinds 1955 plannen voor huisvesting Dans Theater’, NRC Handelsblad, December 22, 1981.
[6] Rainer Bullhorst, ‘Bouwplan: Haags dans- en muziektheater.’ NRC Handelsblad, March 22, 1985.
[7] Carel Birnie, ‘Bouwbericht I’, Bericht aan de NDT Vrienden, nr. 22, 1986.
[8] Carel Birnie, ‘Bouwbericht II’, Bericht aan de NDT Vrienden, nr. 23, 1986. Over the course of the eighties this complex would, furthermore, be extended with several studio’s, which Birnie illegally built by confiscating parking spaces underneath the building while proclaiming ‘NDT goes underground.’ See: Ariejan Korteweg, ‘Bestuurders wijken voor een ‘mal genie’’, De Volkskrant, November 6, 1989.
[9] Luuk Utrecht, ‘Prachtig Haags Danstheater kreeg opening onder niveau’, De Volkskrant, September 12, 1987.
[10] Lesley Leslie-Spinks and Margareta Sörenson, Mats Ek (Stockholm: Bokförlaget Max Ström, 2011).
[11]Paul Derksen, ‘Het fundamentele dansonderzoek van William Forsythe’, NDT Magazine, nr. 14 1999; NDT dancer Glen Eddy in programme 5, season 1985/1986, NDT 1.
[12] Jennifer Dunning, ‘Ohad Naharin at Riverside Theater’, New York Times, October 31, 1982.
For further reading we recommend ‘Nederlands Dans Theater | 60’. This book is published on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of NDT and comprises the personal stories of sixty people aligned to the company, next to the abovementioned text.
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