Serge Lifar

Serge Lifar is a russian dancer, choreographer and teacher naturalized French. He has often been described as a dancer of great physical beauty and a radiant presence, one of the most important of his generation.

After being a student in Kyiv of Bronislava Nijinska, the sister of the great Vaslav Nijinsky, he left like her the Soviet Russia in 1921. He presented himself to Sergei Diaghilev. On his indication Lifar went to Turin, where he worked on improving his technical knowledge, under the direction of Enrico Cecchetti (1850-1928). He started in 1923 with the Russian Ballets and quickly became principal dancer. He then interpreted the main roles in ballets by George Balanchine, and composed his first choreography, a revival of the ballet Renard, in 1929. Diaghilev's death led to the disappearance of the Russian Ballets. While others, like Boris Kochno or Balanchine, strove to recreate new Russian Ballets, Lifar was hired by the Paris Opera. Appointed ballet master of the Paris Opera, from 1930 to 1944 and from 1947 to 1958, he worked to restore the technical level of the Paris Opera Ballet to make it, in the 1930s, one of the best in the world. Yvette Chauviré, Janine Charrat, Roland Petit, among others, have undoubtedly been influenced by him. During his dual career as a dancer and choreographer, he spent 16 years at the Paris Opera, first as first dancer in 1929, then as star dancer, finally as ballet master from 1930 to 1944 and from 1947 to 1958.

When France signed the armistice in 1940, Lifar chose to collaborate with the Germans. He became one of the “stars” of Parisian cultural and social life, with participation of German officers and french collaborators. Throughout the conflict, Radio Londres castigated Lifar and his collaboration with the occupier, promising him death. Inevitably, at the Liberation, he was dismissed from the Opera and "removed from the national stages for life" while one of his young admirers, Robert Hirsch, entered the corps de ballet. Lifar hid in Paris with several ballerina friends. A judicial investigation was opened to examine his conduct, which ended with a dismissal of the case. Meanwhile, he had escaped arrest.

In order to be forgotten, Lifar was hired as director of the Ballets de Monte-Carlo, but not for long, because in 1947, he "returned to grace", and regained his position as master of the Opera ballets. He obtained some important reforms from the management of the Paris Opera, including the creation of an adage class and the establishment of a weekly evening reserved exclusively for dance. In 1955, a chair was entrusted to him at the Sorbonne, for the study of choreography-choreology, the science of dance. He said goodbye to the stage in 1956, in the role of Albert in Giselle.

He continued his choreographic activity throughout the world until 1969, then founded and passionately led the Choreographic Institute of the Opera and the dance university.

In 1967, he conducted the ballets at the imperial coronation in Tehran of the Shah of Iran.

Reported extensively in the newspapers of the time, a sword duel between the Marquis de Cuevas and Serge Lifar took place on March 30, 1959. The two men thus resolved an artistic dispute, in the presence of numerous press photographers and journalists including one with a camera. The quarrel had its origins in a disagreement over the revival of the Lifar ballet Noir et Blanc (or Suite en blanc) by the Grand Ballet du Marquis de Cuevas. During a rather heated discussion, the marquis had slapped Lifar, who demanded reparation on the meadow. Cuevas was then 73 years old, Lifar 54. The date was set and the meeting took place in Blaru, near Vernon in Normandy. After three attempts, Lifar allowed himself to be hit in the forearm. “I thought I had pierced my son,” declared the Marquis, and they fell into each other's arms.

In 1958, Lifar met Inge Lisa Nymberg, who became his friend and "guardian angel", introducing herself under the name Countess of Ahlefeldt-Laurvig, following a short-lived marriage to Count Danish of this name. Considering himself too little appreciated in Paris, Lifar lived for ten years in Monte-Carlo, then, after a brief return to Paris, the couple moved to Lausanne, where he was mainly concerned with writing his memoirs. It was in this city that he died.