"Oh yes, technique has definitely advanced. But you never advance without losing something en passant, and you lose it because you're paying so much attention to the new thing"
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Progress in art always arrives with a receipt, and de Valois is itemizing the hidden charges. As a dancer and founding force in British ballet, she lived through a century of institutionalization: training codified, standards tightened, bodies engineered for feats that earlier eras barely imagined. Her opening concession, "Oh yes", carries the weary patience of someone who has heard the sales pitch for innovation too many times. Technique has advanced; no argument there. The barb is that advancement is not a moral upgrade, just a trade.
"En passant" is the sly, dancerly tell. It borrows a term that suggests passing through, almost casually, as if the loss happens mid-step before anyone notices. The subtext is not anti-technical; it's anti-fetish. When you "pay so much attention to the new thing", you start optimizing for what can be measured, demonstrated, and rewarded: higher extensions, cleaner lines, bigger turns, the kind of virtuosity that photographs well and wins competitions. What slips away is harder to score: musicality that risks imperfection, dramatic intelligence, idiosyncrasy, the unteachable magnetism of a performer who isn't interchangeable.
De Valois is also talking about institutions - companies, academies, critics - that build incentives. If the culture prizes novelty and difficulty, dancers learn to chase them, and teachers teach to the test. Her warning lands beyond ballet: every field that upgrades its tools risks downgrading its soul, not out of malice, but out of attention. The sharpness is in the diagnosis: loss isn't tragedy; it's distraction.
"En passant" is the sly, dancerly tell. It borrows a term that suggests passing through, almost casually, as if the loss happens mid-step before anyone notices. The subtext is not anti-technical; it's anti-fetish. When you "pay so much attention to the new thing", you start optimizing for what can be measured, demonstrated, and rewarded: higher extensions, cleaner lines, bigger turns, the kind of virtuosity that photographs well and wins competitions. What slips away is harder to score: musicality that risks imperfection, dramatic intelligence, idiosyncrasy, the unteachable magnetism of a performer who isn't interchangeable.
De Valois is also talking about institutions - companies, academies, critics - that build incentives. If the culture prizes novelty and difficulty, dancers learn to chase them, and teachers teach to the test. Her warning lands beyond ballet: every field that upgrades its tools risks downgrading its soul, not out of malice, but out of attention. The sharpness is in the diagnosis: loss isn't tragedy; it's distraction.
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