Location matters. Being born and working in St. Petersburg/Leningrad holds significance. The city historically emerged from the imperial vision of Peter the Great as a "Window to Europe." It's no surprise, then, that the Natalya Kasparova Dance Company, born from the Kannon Dance Center founded by Natalya and Vadim Kasparov, has a style more akin to that of a Western company. Established in 1999, the group features dancers with diverse training that aligns closely with European artists. This reflects the artistic and professional richness of the founder, a perfect representative of a Russia that, after the fall of the Soviet regime, decisively severed ties with classical ballet tradition to embrace Western techniques like jazz dance and contemporary dance—subjects that were once clandestine during Soviet times.
This is why the Kannon Dance Center pays close attention to jazz and cinema. Throughout the year, it organizes a jazz dance and music festival; then Kinodance, a festival of dance and music from cinema; and finally Open Look, a summer dance festival held in early July.
Kasparova's company has been making strides on the international scene and is a regular guest at festivals and events. In previous years, the group participated in a Wagnerian production at the Mariinsky Theatre. Nevertheless, a taste for the specific Russian and local themes re-emerges in some of Kasparova's works. The Songs of Komitas, a suite of pieces by the Armenian composer Komitas, is charged with pathos and illustrates the tragic fate of the Armenian people as well as the personal struggles of the author. The pieces evoke legends and traditions of the ancient Caucasian people, depicted without easy concessions to the spectacular, maintained on a severe and austere level—almost like an expressionist film in black and white.
http://www.kannondance.org/
