Women artists of the Ballets Russes at McNay Art Museum

The Ballets Russes’ revolutionary costume and set designs, innovative choreography and music, and captivating themes transformed ballet in the early 20th century, and their groundbreaking work continues to influence the art form today. McNay Art Museum celebrates the dance company’s seldomly recognized contributors in “Women Artists of the Ballets Russes: Designing the Legacy,” on view October 10, 2024 through January 12, 2025. The exhibition assembles original costumes, set and costume designs and archival photographs to acquaint visitors with the often-overlooked female artists, dancers, choreographers, costume makers and financial patrons who made Ballets Russes productions possible.

Much of the exhibition is drawn from the McNay’s renowned Tobin Collection of Theatre Arts that spans more than 500 years. The artworks, designs and costumes take on new dimension as they’re presented through the context of their female creators. The exhibition also includes costumes, designs and ephemera on loan from other institutions, reuniting several designs with their realized costume and set pieces for the first time in nearly a century.

“While the genesis and impact of Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes (1909-1929) is well known, the incredible women who worked with this company on and off stage have often been overlooked,” Caroline Hamilton, Ballets Russes costume and dance historian and exhibition co-curator, said. “This exhibition aims to celebrate and give voice to these female artists and financial patrons who worked with the Ballets Russes and contributed to its legacy.”

The McNay centers “Women Artists of the Ballets Russes” on artists Natalia Gontcharova, Sonia Delaunay and Alexandra Exter and dancer and choreographer Bronislava Nijinska. Other highlights showcase women who worked behind the scenes, including costume makers such as Barbara Karinska; financial patrons like Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel, who also designed for the company; and Princess de Polignac, heir to the Singer sewing machine fortune. Recent research offers insight into the costume makers and includes new information about designs that were historically misattributed to other productions.

Gontcharova was known for her vibrant and floral designs and combined elements of Russian folk art and contemporary painting with her sense of humor to create spirited designs that cemented her artistic relationship with ballet through the 1950s. The McNay honors Gontcharova’s contributions with several of her bold designs from their collection. The exhibition includes her vibrant red curtain design for the prologue for “Le Coq d’Or” as well as the drop for the tent of the Queen Shemakhan reunited with the Queen of Shemakhan’s cloak on loan from the Dansmuseet in Stockholm. The exhibition also includes a design and costume from Gontcharova’s fantastical 1916 underwater ballet “Sadko.”

Visitors to the exhibition will have the opportunity to examine Delaunay’s design for Cléopâtre and her attendants from the 1918 production of “Cléopâtre (Cleopatra).” Her 1918 designs replaced Léon Bakst’s original 1909 sets and costumes that were partially destroyed in a fire. Better known for her work as a fashion designer, Delaunay introduced bold colors and geometric designs that were also evident in her later stage work and fashion designs, a hallmark of her celebrated “simultanéisme” technique that juxtaposed contrasting hues and shapes to create movement and rhythm.

Nijinska’s contributions to ballet spanned more than 60 years. She joined the Ballets Russes in 1909 as a dancer with her brother Vaslav Nijinsky, the company’s most celebrated dancer. Though lesser known than Nijinsky, Nijinska’s creativity had a longer-lasting impact on the ballet company, where, in 1921 she was both choreographer and dancer. “Women of the Ballets Russes: Designing the Legacy” highlights Nijinska’s avant-garde choreographic style through stunning ballets like “Les Noces,” “Le Train Bleu,” “Les Biches” and “Le Renard” as well as her additions to “The Sleeping Princess.” Nijinska settled in the United States in the late 1930s and would be instrumental in training the first wave of American born ballet dancers.

Exter collaborated with Nijinska from the late 1910s, and although she never worked for the Ballets Russes, in 1925 she created the designs for six new ballets for the U.K. tour of the Théâtre Chorégraphique Nijinska. This included the ballet “Holy Etudes,” which brought a modernist and constructivist vision to the stage. Exter garnered international acclaim for her set and costume designs and taught stage design and worked in performing arts in France, Italy and England.

The McNay’s exhibition also focuses on the legacy of the Ballets Russes in the USA and how this paved the way for dancers of color who found historic opportunities with the companies that emerged in the wake of the Ballets Russes. Personal ephemera mark their historic accomplishments, introducing dialogue about the contemporary issues of representation on stage. Among these women are ballerinas Sono Osato and Raven Wilkinson, the first Asian American and the first African American to dance with a major company respectively, and Maria Tallchief who was taught by Nijinska and would become the first Native American prima ballerina.

“The McNay is fortunate to hold one of the most significant performing art collections in the world with the Tobin Collection of Theatre Arts,” Matthew McLendon, director and CEO of the McNay Art Museum, said. “This exhibition employs works from the collection to give a voice to female creatives who are often overlooked in the telling of ballet history. ‘Women Artists of the Ballets Russes: Designing the Legacy’ broadens that story and invites visitors to contemplate who else may be missing from well-known stories throughout art history.”

The McNay’s Tobin Collection of Theatre Arts includes more than 10,000 paintings, works on paper, maquettes and sculpture and 2,000 rare books of European and American theatre design from 1600 to the present. The collection is the life’s work and continued legacy of its namesake, the late philanthropist Robert L. B. Tobin, who was devoted to the celebration of visual arts in the theatre. This year marks the museum’s 70th anniversary, which coincides with the 40th anniversary of the Tobin Wing and the 90th birthday anniversary of the late Robert L. B. Tobin.

About the McNay Museum

The McNay Art Museum engages a diverse community in the discovery and enjoyment of the visual arts. Built in the 1920s by artist and educator Marion Koogler McNay, the Spanish Colonial Revival residence became the site of Texas’ first modern art museum when it opened in 1954.

Today, 200,000 visitors a year enjoy works by modern masters including Paul Gauguin, Vincent van Gogh, Edward Hopper, Joan Mitchell, Alice Neel, Georgia O’Keeffe, Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock and Pierre-Auguste Renoir. The 25 acres of beautifully landscaped grounds include sculptures by Willie Cole, Robert Indiana, Luis A. Jiménez Jr., Alejandro Martín, George Rickey, Joel Shapiro, Kiki Smith, Tom Wesselmann and others.