Just over two years ago, Tamara Rojo became the first artistic director of the San Francisco Ballet since its founding in 1933. "I arrived in a rather privileged situation", says the choreographer via video conference from her home overlooking the Golden Gate. "My predecessor, Helgi Tomasson [who held the position for 37 years], left a very important legacy with great international projection." It was, she assures, a very continuous transfer of power. "From the beginning, I understood that my role was to build and innovate on the solid foundations of one of the world's great companies. At no time did I intend to be Attila or destroy a single stone of the glorious history of this institution."
Last January, Rojo inaugurated her first season with the premiere at the War Memorial Opera House of Mere Mortals, a work on artificial intelligence that sold out thanks to an immersive proposal where music and dance converge in a futuristic space made of lights and visual effects. "We added performances week after week until we reached the incredible figure of 10,000 people who had never attended a ballet performance." It has not been the only record she has broken since her arrival at the Civic Center: she also received a historic donation of 60 million dollars destined for the creation and acquisition of new works to continue expanding the repertoire.
From October 15 to 22, the SFBallet will settle an important outstanding account during its first visit to the Teatro Real in Madrid with the famous version that Tomasson devised for Swan Lake by Tchaikovsky. "We are talking about a very traditional production", acknowledges the former Spanish dancer (although born in Montreal in 1974). "This captivating version is very clean and easy to follow, there are no Freudian dilemmas about the identity games of Odette [the swan princess] and Odile [the sorcerer's daughter who tries to seduce Siegfried]." The "integrity and honesty of the costumes and the careful scenography" allow the dancers to display all their talent "with no other aim than to conquer the hearts of the audience."
More than nine thousand kilometers separate the headquarters of the SFBallet from the Víctor Ullate Dance Center where Tamara Rojo took her first steps as a dancer. "Despite the distance changing your perspective a bit, I have the feeling that in Spain, which is a leading cultural power, things have not changed much since I left over 30 years ago," she confesses. "As long as there ispolitical intervention in the appointment of artistic positions in public institutions, there will be no way to propose, at least in terms of dance, solid and transparent projects that can be maintained in the long term and resist attempts at ideological control by parties on both sides."
In the past, Rojo presented a project to the government to revitalize Spanish dance that fell on deaf ears. "Of course, I would like to return to my country", says the person who many believe would be the most suitable to take the reins of the National Dance Company. "I think sometimes we are not aware of the heritage we have. That's why I don't understand the lack of political will to let artists, from any field, work in absolute freedom." Beyond that and the funding system in the United States through sponsors and patrons, she does not believe that there is a true transatlantic gap in terms of demands and audience tastes. "In the end, we are all human and we have our little hearts...".
"I have never felt a glass ceiling over my head, but it is true that I never danced a choreography created by a woman"
In England, Rojo launched a program commissioning choreographies from women. "I have never felt a glass ceiling over my head, but the truth is that in 30 years of career, I have never danced a piece created by a woman," confesses the creator of two recent works, Raymonda for the English National Ballet and Cinderella commissioned by the Royal Ballet of Sweden. "They have been experiences as stimulating as they have been exhausting, so I have decided to take a break to focus on other priorities of the SFBallet," in whose structure several Spanish names appear: at least six dancers and the associate director Antonio Castilla, her right-hand man in the company, with whom she had already coincided in London.
THE (SCENIC) CARDS ON THE TABLE
There, as a member of the Creative Industries Council in the United Kingdom, Rojo actively defended the importance of performing arts during the pandemic. "The lockdown forced us to lay all the cards on the table. Now, no one dares to question the importance of a live show, regardless of whether we can and should broadcast it on the internet." According to the choreographer, the generational relay is guaranteed both on stage ("there are young dancers of a very high level," she celebrates) and in the audience: "In a turbulent and polarized world like the current one, the audience seeks to escape, of course, but above all to share experiences and feel that they belong to a community."
No one better than Tamara Rojo knows to what extent the notion of discipline has been redefined in recent years to give room for debates on mental health. "In recent years, we have witnessed a revolution in the way directors treat dancers," she says, who has led this change in the working conditions of companies with great determination. "But none of this is achieved only with good intentions, but it is necessary to invest in psycho-pedagogical teams and trainers." Because, for Rojo, only happy artists dare to take risks, to expose themselves emotionally, and to give their best. "In this way, we manage to prolong the careers of dancers who previously did not even reach artistic maturity."
She hung up her ballet shoes in 2022 after more than three decades of applause. "I remember I was performing in a Black Swan and for the first timeI experienced stage fright... I felt that I did not havetotal control over my body." To this new stage (last June she turned 50), she only asks for, she says, tranquility. "And I am the first to get into trouble!... I can't help it." Things of vocation, whose call she heard when she was 5 years old. "That afternoon it was pouring rain, and I took refuge in the school gym waiting for my mother to pick me up." There, a teacher invited her to witness her first ballet class. The rest is history, a story of success. "Even today, I wonder what would have become of me without that storm...".