The Big Ballet
In the comments, msruth mentioned Russia’s “Big Ballet” and on her advice, I went to go take a look and read all about them.
The Big Ballet is a troupe of dancers from Russia who weigh a minimum of 220 pounds each. I highly recommend clicking on the larger size of the picture, and going to visit the photo gallery for some more beautiful and inspiring photos.
The Big Ballet formed in 1994 and set out to deliberately and, above all, self-confidently challenge accepted social standards in a world where the pursuit of slenderness and beauty seems obsessive. The dancers courageously and imposingly prove that grace, elegance, charisma and nimbleness is not the demesne of the “thin”, proudly presenting their voluptuous yet surprisingly sinuous and flexible figures.
Msruth described them as:
[W]omen who had done it since they were kids, were obsessed, gave it all their time, were really talented etc etc, but had been getting increasingly marginalised by their schools as they grew into their adult bodies…so they formed their own school or something, I don’t quite remember, but hurrah! Anyway, to quit rambling, the point was they were so graceful and beautiful and such amazing dancers, that even though at first I thought it was just going to be a novelty thing, but by the end I’d forgotten they were ‘fat ballet dancers’, they’d just become dancers.
Again, that photo is so lovely. And as I said on Flickr, such a contrast to the “headless fattie” photo discussed here. Awesome.
[ETA: And it turns out Weetabix posted about the Big Ballet on this very blog over a year ago! Check it out; she's got even more info for you.]
Posted by mo pie
Filed under: Advocacy, Art, BFD Classic, Exercise, Fat Positive, Feel Good Friday, International, Theater
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Wow! Beautiful!
I took ballet when I was a kid, but good never get on pointe. I’m jealous,lol!
I think this is wonderful. In fact i’m going to send it to a former dancer friend of mine. I knew several friends that did dance in school and it seemed the minute they developed boobs and hips (and I am NOT talking plus size girls here) they were ousted, or chose to quit because of the constant nagging. I was upset about it then that the assumption was that either A) they weren’t as attractive as dancers with breasts or B) it made them too heavy to dance for some ridiculous reason. If a 200 plus pound woman can go on point, then an adolescent girl that grows boobs can go on point. thank you for this post!
I wish I’d seen this when I was a little fat girl taking ballet class and feeling like I was all wrong.
Just a question: since in Russian “bolshoi” means “big”, what EXACTLY does this troupe of gloriously curvaceous ballerinas call itself in order to differentiate from the Moscow-based Bolshoi Ballet?
Oh, wow. Fantastic. I was another ballet kid who actually quit classes after I and another girl got put down two grades because they didn’t want two fat girls ‘spoiling’ the exam lineups – no kidding – so this is a revelation.
It was Anna Pavlova who started the fashion for extreme thinness in ballet – she was skinnier than many of her counterparts at the time – so it’s kind of ironically appropriate to see Russians doing this!
? ??????! (I love it!)
I’m not sure what they’d call it- I’ll break out the ol’ dictionary, lol. I’m not even sure I spelled love correctly, but my handwriting looks a lot different from the character map.
This actually makes me sad, now. I worked really hard at ballet, and I was actually pretty good. I was told that I couldn’t be serious about it because if I weighed over 120lbs, my ankles would break from my mass. I might have to break out the ol’ pointe shoes over spring break!
Thanks for posting this!!!!
Thank you so much for posting this! How inspiring and beautiful!
That’s cool. Nice to see people demonstrating that, just because you were born with a different body type doesn’t mean you can’t have talent. I feel the same way about female engineers (like me). Its even better in this case because (unlike me) they get international recognition.
That’s pretty awesome. Now if only more professional female athletes could be heavy-set.
Also of note: “what 200 pounds looks like.” These beautiful dancers are a BMI-project microcosm right there, with their curvy waists and shapely legs.
I LOVE the pictures of them tossing their hot boy-toys around, and the boys look very happy with their lot.
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR POSTING THIS!
It has absolutely made my day! I adored doing tap and ballet classes when I was a kid, but then felt too fat for it when I became a pre-teen. Now I really regret giving up on it!
All of those pictures were so beautiful…I’d love to see them perform!
I think one of the best things about them is I first found out about them when they performed on a children’s show called ‘Blue Peter’ that I was watching with my younger cousins. So, apart from just generally being gorgeous, kids nationwide got to see you can still be beautiful and graceful even if you aren’t super slim.
So not to get flamed, but I am curious how this is much different than the men who we all discussed earlier. It is a group of overweight people dancing and the focus is that they are all large and having fun. Also, it bothers me that the men that dance with them are all thin-why is that?
“I wish I’d seen this when I was a little fat girl taking ballet class and feeling like I was all wrong.”
Not just even feeling all wrong, but being TOLD by my ballet instructor that I was.
(A pox on him forever — and Angie and Emerald’s teachers too. I want to state here for the record that apparently, dancers can be just as stupid as other stupid people. I think when I was younger and innocent that I believed that being creative was pro facie evidence that people were not stupid. *Bops self in head for stupid assumption*)
I would have kept going — and I might even have developed into a decent dancer, because I started lessons at 9 and was accepted into a modern and jazz troupe in college.
I had seen some of the pictures, but I didn’t see this one where the ballerina is even on toe (which is supposed to be just *anathema maranatha* if you’re an “overweight” dancer — never mind that it doesn’t matter if you’re 85 pounds, if you’re en pointe doing 2 rehearsals and 3 classes daily and 5 performances weekly for, like, a year, your feet ARE going to bunion and bleed at some point).
“Also, it bothers me that the men that dance with them are all thin-why is that?”
I thought that was a little odd too, but it’s less odd if the ballerinas are also lifting their escorts.
Plus, as any ballet student knows, it’s *say it with me* harder to find male dancers, so the gentlemen who are proficient are probably let in when they audition no matter what they look like. (Hee hee hee hee …)
On the guy thing, I’m thinking (and it’s just a guess as I have no experience here) young boys often get teased about taking ballet (instead of “society approved” martial arts, football etc.) so already you have a smaller ratio of guys-to-girls, then factor in a non-slim boy wanting to do ballet; the teasing would be twice as bad.
I want to state here for the record that apparently, dancers can be just as stupid as other stupid people.
You want the really stupid thing, littlem? The teacher who did that to me and the other fat girl, was herself fat. We were taught by two sisters, a fat one who instructed us while her very thin sister demonstrated the actual steps, but the fatter one was the older of the two, and she was in charge.
The sad thing was, they lived not far from me and I’d always really liked them up till that point. And I told them I was leaving because school exams didn’t leave me time to dance – I never told them the real reason.
thank you so much (:
i’m an overweight girl, i’ve taken dance for 7 years now. i was about to quit this year but now im not.
im going to reach my dream of going on pointe (;
thank you~
Oh my, this not only made my day, this made my entire month! Year, even!!!!
I’m 13 years old and overweight, especially by dancing standards.
I used to dance when I was younger, but I quit when I was ten because, ever since I was little, I was always the biggest one in the class.
Despite quitting, I never lost my love for ballet and continued dancing on my own time. I saved up for months for new pointe shoes but when I got to the store, I walked in and ran right out. I seemed like a fish out of water, a mammoth shopping amongst twigs.
But this article REALLY inspired me: I start classes in a month.
And I’m going for those shoes tomorrow =3