Click here for a portrait of Fokine.
Michel Fokine (1880-1942) was trained at the Imperial School in St Petersburg and joined Diaghilev's Ballets Russes in 1909. In 1923, he moved to the United States, where he re-staged pieces for the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo and American Ballet Theatre.
Fokine objected to what he considered arbitrary and artificial conventions and sterile technique and strove for a more natural and expressive choreographic style. (This is a recurrent theme in ballet; Noverre called for almost the same thing in his Letters.) His influence and ideas undoubtedly contributed to the early success of Diaghilev's company. He choreographed a number of plotless ballets, most notably Chopiniana (later Les Sylphides), which even tually led Balanchine to try the plotless ballets that ultimately became his trademark.
Among his ballets for the Ballets Russes :
Some later works:
