Dancers: Mila Cirul

 

Max Pollak

  1886 - 1970 (biography)

c. 1920  

drypoint 

21 1/2 x 8 3/8" platemark 

pencil, lower right 

14 of 120  

pencil titled and editioned; small image of an elephant with the word "Bu-Bu" etched into the plate, lower right (unidentified meaning; perhaps it was an early attempt at an artist's seal, a la Whistler's butterfly) 

 

cream wove 

published 

artist 

22813 

SOLD

Mila Cirul (1901 - 1977) was a Latvian dancer who trained at the Moscow Ballet under famed teacher Mikael Mordkin before pursuing modern dance, inspired by Isadora Duncan. She studied with influential modern dancer Ellen Tels, with whom she started the Ellen Tels School in Vienna in 1919. She eventually became known for her solo work as well, performing in the operas of Berlin, Vienna, and Hanover, taking up a brief stints with the Munich Dance Congress and Margarethe Wallmann's Tanzegruppe. In 1932 she moved to Paris where she found fame as an avant garde performer, known for her passionate performances that contrasted with the classical compositions she danced to. She continued to dance until the 1940s when she began teaching, becoming a mentor to many of Paris' most famous modern dancers until her retirement in 1962.