Special evening of Prague Chamber Ballet dedicated to prof. Pavel Šmok commemorating 90 years since his birth (1927). This evening will feature a premiere of a documentary portrait bearing the same name directed by Ondřej Kepka, Šmok’s choreographies On an Overgrown Path and Wild Dove in a renewed production led by Kateřina Dedková – Franková. This unique event will commemorate one of the most outstanding Czechoslovak choreographers of the 20th century, the founder and long-time artistic leader of the Prague Chamber Ballet – PAVEL ŠMOK.
The evening will be accompanied by a video-projection of unique photographs showing Pavel Šmok, Luboš Ogoun and Vladimír Vašut, co-founders of the legendary dance studio BALLET PRAGUE.
Idea: Ladislava Jandová
Script and direction: Ondřej Kepka
Performing: Prague Chamber Ballet
Light design: Monika Petrušková
Sound direction: Tomáš Kučera
Program:
ON AN OVERGROWN PATH
Choreography: Pavel Šmok, Kateřina Dedková – Franková
Music: Leoš Janáček
Staging: Kateřina Dedková – Franková
Assistant choreographers: Igor Vejsada
Set and costume design: Marie Franková
Premiere: 14.6.1998
Renewed premiere: 7.12.2017
Duration: 29 minutes
The first part of the cycle On an Overgrown Path ends by a composition which Janáček titled Sýček neodletěl (The Barn Owl Has Not Flown Away). The motif of a barn owl, in his strength and dramatic effect not unlike the Beethoven’s Destiny Symphony, lends a distinctive tragic accent to the staging. When the choreography was premiered in 1998, Pavel Šmok commented: “The individual compositions of the cycle have not got any stronger mutual dramaturgic connection apart from the fact that they all are internal testimonies of the composer. Dance stage is, nevertheless, quite different from a concert hall. Therefore, I believe that Janáček would forgive us for inserting a little story inside the performance which is loosely based on a motif of another of his compositions, anyway.”
Documentary portrait “PHENOMENON ŠMOK”
Script, direction and production: Ondřej Kepka
Camera: Daniel Hnát and Robert Novák
Editing: Petr Kozák
Duration: 30 minutes
The documentary portrait directed by Ondřej Kepka presents a compact, authentic material on Pavel Šmok collected over a period of time spanning the last years of his life which he spent at his weekend house in Nekoř. The film also includes many materials from the archives of the Czech Television and from personal archive of Pavel Šmok, the former members of Ballet Prague and Prague Chamber Ballet dance companies, his contemporaries and from archive of Prague Chamber Ballet.
Wild Dove
Music: Antonín Dvořák
Choreography: Pavel Šmok
Staging: Kateřina Dedková – Franková
Asssistant choreographer: Igor Vejsada
Costume design: Petra Lebdušková based on original designs by Věra Mejtová
Set design: Petra Lebdušková based on original designs by Milan Čech
Renewed premiere: 23.10.2016
Duration: 20 minutes
Wild Dove is a famous ballad by Karel Jaromír Erben which inspired Antonín Dvořák to write a symphonic poem bearing the same name. He composed it in 1896 in Žďár. A young woman poisons her husband and marries a new, young suitor shortly afterwards. However, her guilty conscience drives her to suffering so unbearable that she commits suicide in the end.
When Wild Dove was premiered in 1993, Pavel Šmok commented: “In his Wild Dove, Dvořák does not follow Erben’s ballad in a literal way. And neither does my dancing rendition. It does not narrate the story in a linear manner. I decided for a ‘theatre in theatre’ form and set the story in the environment of a weird carnival procession: the story is kind of changing into the widow’s nightmare and the gentle dove into a death's-head hawkmoth.”
