Bronislava Nijinska

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Lore & Background

Bronislava Nijinska was the third child of Polish dancers Tomasz Niżyński and Eleonora née Bereda, who were traveling performers in provincial Russia. She was born in Minsk. All three children were baptized in the Holy Cross Church in Warsaw, she on 30 April 1891. Her older brother was Vaslav Nijinsky, a dancer of world renown. Following serious home training, at age nine she entered the state ballet school in Saint Petersburg. In 1908 she graduated as an 'Artist of the Imperial Theatres'. An early breakthrough came in Paris in 1910 when she became a member of Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, creating the role of Papillon in Carnaval. She assisted her brother Vaslav as he worked up his controversial choreography for L'Après-midi d'un faune, premiered in Paris in 1912, and similarly aided him in his 1913 ballet The Rite of Spring.

Reader's Guide

Nijinska's significance lies in her role as a choreographer who broke from 19th-century classical ballet, introducing modern forms, steps, and motion with a minimalist narrative. After surviving war and revolution in Petrograd and Kiev, she worked in dance and struggled to independently develop her own artistic vision. She started a ballet school on progressive lines in Kiev. In 1921 she fled Soviet authorities who had closed her school. Rejoining Ballets Russes, Diaghilev appointed her choreographer. She thrived, creating several popular, cutting-edge ballets. In 1923, with a score by Igor Stravinsky, she choreographed her iconic work Les noces. Starting in 1925, with a variety of companies and venues she designed and mounted ballets in Europe and the Americas, including Teatro Colón, Ida Rubinstein, Vienna Staatsoper, and Ballet Theatre. In the 1960s for The Royal Ballet in London, she staged revivals of her Ballets Russes-era creations. Her Early Memoirs, translated into English, was published posthumously.

Did You Know?

• Nijinska was baptized in the Holy Cross Church in Warsaw on 30 April 1891.
• At age nine she entered the state ballet school in Saint Petersburg, graduating in 1908 as an 'Artist of the Imperial Theatres'.
• She created the role of Papillon in Carnaval, a ballet written and designed by Michel Fokine, in 1910.
• She assisted her brother Vaslav Nijinsky in his controversial choreography for L'Après-midi d'un faune (1912) and The Rite of Spring (1913).
• Her iconic work Les noces, with a score by Igor Stravinsky, was choreographed in 1923.