Taglioni, Marie

Taglioni, Marie

(born April 23, 1804, Stockholm, Swed.—died April 24, 1884, Marseille, Fr.) Italian ballet dancer. She trained with her dancer-choreographer father, Filippo Taglioni (1777–1871), and made her debut in Vienna in 1822. In her father's ballet La Sylphide, introduced at the Paris Opéra in 1832, she became one of the first to dance on pointe. She created a delicate new style, marked by floating leaps and balanced poses such as the arabesque, that typified the early 19th-century Romantic style. Her diaphanous white skirts would evolve into the tutu worn by most classical ballerinas. She toured throughout Europe and, after leaving the Opéra in 1837, danced with the Imperial Ballet in St. Petersburg; she retired from dancing in 1847.

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Taglioni, Marie 

Born Apr. 23, 1804, in Stockholm; died Apr. 22, 1884, in Marseille. Italian ballerina; prominent exponent of the romantic ballet.

Taglioni studied under her father, the famous choreographer F. Taglioni, and made her debut in 1822 in Vienna. From 1827 to 1835 she appeared in Paris, where she won international fame in 1832 for creating the title role in Schneitzhöffer’s La Sylphide, choreographed by her father. Taglioni greatly influenced the development of ballet. Her dancing was characterized by spirituality, purity, exceptional grace, and fluidity. With the assistance of her father, who staged nearly all the ballets in which she appeared, she introduced new methods of expression into ballet, notably point work. The diaphanous costume created for her by the artist E. Lami promoted the romantic reform in ballet dancing.

Taglioni appeared annually in St. Petersburg from 1837 to 1842. She later toured in London, where J. Perrot choreographed parts for her in C. Pugni’s Pas de Quatre (1845) and The Judgement of Paris (1846). Taglioni left the stage in 1847 and taught dancing to the children of English aristocrats. The famous ballerina E. Livry was one of Taglioni’s students. Taglioni died in poverty.

REFERENCES

Solov’ev, N. V. Mania Tal’oni, 1804–1884. St. Petersburg, 1912.
Slonimskii, Iu. “Sil’fida”: Balet. Leningrad, 1927.
Krasovskaia, V. Russkii baletnyi teatr ol vozniknoveniia do serediny XIX veka. Leningrad-Moscow, 1958.
Levinson, A. Marie Taglioni (1804–1884). Paris, 1929.
Guest, I. The Romantic Ballet in Paris. London, 1966.