1. 5. 1908 Kiev (Ukraine) – 16. 2. 1952 Brno
The authorship of the artistic name Ivo Váňa can be ascribed to the Brno theatre director František Neumann. The father of the future ballet master was a secondary school teacher, and his mother was a solo ballerina. The family moved from Kiev to St. Petersburg, after which Jaroslav Psota returned to his homeland and became director of a business academy. After his death (1926) Mrs. Psotová opened a private ballet school. Ivo graduated from the ballet school of Augustin Berger in Prague (1919-1923) and immediately afterwards was given work in the ballet company of the Prague National Theatre. His brilliant technical ability, lightness of movement, and musical and spatial imagination set him on the path both towards becoming a solo ballet dancer and also choreographer. In 1926 he went to Brno, where two years later the director Neumann named him Head of Ballet at the Brno theatre. The twenty-year-old Psota also taught dance externally at the Brno conservatoire. Of his choreographical work during his first Brno period his premiere of Bohuslav Martinů’s Divadlo za branou and Signorina Gioventú to the music of Vítězslav Novák stand out, and in these ballet stagings Psota also created excellent solo parts. After Neumann’s death (1929) Václav Jiřikovský took up the post of director of Brno theatre. He did not get on well with Psota and named him head of operetta ballet, but even in this position Psota created a number of fresh pieces of choreography. In September 1932 he was made a lucrative offer at a newly created company, the Original Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, led by Vassily Voskrestiensky, which Psota accepted. In Russian ballet he was able to fully develop his excellent dance and choreographical skills, and together with the company he toured the major European cities (Paris, London) with great success and large cities in the Netherlands, Belgium and Switzerland. Their European success brought the ensemble an invitation to America, and they performed with huge acclaim in the country’s main cities. Critics wrote that Psota was a leading foreign dancer, who had the lion’s share of the success on the American tour. In Russian ballet he was well acquainted with the supreme expression of classical dance, both from a technical and expression perspective, and worked together with the greatest choreographers of the day. He proved his art in particular in Miassin’s choreographies (Blue Danube to the music of Strauss, Firebird by Igor Stravinsky, and Symphonie Fantastique by Hector Berlioz). As well as his excellent dance performances Psota’s acclimatisation abroad was helped by his knowledge of eight languages (his father Jaroslav could speak thirteen) and his perfect social bearing. In 1936 he returned to Brno, where Jiřikovský was still in charge, but thanks to his foreign success and unique human attributes Psota gained recognition, authority and popularity. He took on the post of director of the National Theatre ballet company in Brno. As a choreographer he debuted the drama the Orphan’s Dream by Jaroslav Kvapil (1936), shortly followed by B.Martinů’s Divadlo za branou. This in turn was follwed by a number of successful works (Tamara by N. A. Balakirev, Signorina Gioventú by V. Novák, for which the author wrote Psota a personal letter of thanks, Rossini’s opera The Magic Toy Shop, Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake, The Slavonic Dances by Antonín Dvořák, the world premiere of Sergei Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet in 1938, and From Tale to Tale and Stupid Jack by Oskar Nedbal). As well as this, Psota rediscovered previously performed works and choreographed a number of them for the opera company. In his stagings he used his great mastery to create main and secondary roles, to bewitch audiences with his classical figures in both comic and character roles. He established his own dance school in Brno, which has educated several renowned Czech classical dancers (Skálová, Nermut, Avratová, Malcev and others). In 1941 Psota managed to gain permission from the occupying forces to travel to the USA after many months of trying, and he became head of ballet at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where he excellently choreographed Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances. In the same year Psota returned to the Original Ballet Russe company, which employed leading world choreographers and the most famous performers, and Psota smoothly fitted in with both groups. The group had huge international success in Latin America, where he was inspired by the original South American themes. Of these the most famous was the ballet Yara on the theme of myths about Brazilian water goddesses, for which the composer Francisco Mignone, the author of the libretto the poet Guilherme de Almeida, stage designer Candido Portinari and the choreographer Ivo Váňa Psota joined forces. In return for Yara, which became the Brazilian national ballet, a memorial plaque was unveiled in Sao Paulo to Psota.
After the war the most famous dance company in the world, the Ballet Russe, suffered a serious financial crisis and disbanded. Ivo Váňa Psota did not accept an attractive offer of the post of director of ballet at the Colón theatre in Buenos Aires, nor for the same post at the Prague National Theatre, and instead in 1947 he returned to Brno, to where he wanted to bring his rich experience from abroad. On the Brno stage he introduced his master choreography as well as his rich repertoire, which he had gained from his time abroad, and also new works. These novelties included the ballet Král Ječmínek by Karel Horký, the Symphony of Life to the music of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony (1949). The last work that Psota staged was Tchaikovsky’s Sleeping Beauty (1952). Worn down by political slighting and intrigues within the company, Psota died before the premiere took place.
The great choreographer and dancer Ivo Váňa Psota brought Brno ballet to the highest level, and his dance school is still a household name. To this day his work represents a unique contribution by Czech art to the work cultural development. A memorial plaque by Luděk Řehořík was unveiled in 1993 on the house on Kaplanova Street where the artist lived from 1939 until 1952. The new owners of the building have however decided to remove it. |
