Istvan Dvorak

Istvan Dvorak (born June 6, 1946 in Diósgyőr , Hungary ) is a Hungarian ballet master, ballet dancer, pantomime, dance teacher, musical performer, choreographer and artistic consultant.

Life

Dvorak's grandfather was the psychologist August Dvorak , his great-grandfather the Czech composer Antonín Dvořák and his father was also a musician. Part of the family emigrated to America and another part, including his father, to Hungary in the 1920s.

Because of his joy in movement and disinterest in music, he decided as a child to do competitive gymnastics. He has always felt connected to the ground and describes himself as a "grounded" person, which is why it was clear early on that he would devote himself to this direction.

Dvorak had his first active contact with the Hungarian-Czech folk dance culture at the age of seven . At the age of eleven he took part in regional competitions in Hungary and became, among other things, regional gymnastics champion in Hungary. After an injury during gymnastics, however, he had to restructure and from then on devoted himself completely to ballet lessons, which were already offered in addition to the gymnastics lessons.

Between the ages of 13-14, Dvorak performed at the theater in Miskolc , Hungary. His father observed the development of his son over the years and saw how much he enjoyed dancing and what talent resided in him. To support him, he organized an audition at the then State Ballet Institute in Budapest in the early 1960s.

Act

In 1962 Dvorak was admitted to the State Ballet Institute in Budapest and graduated as a dance teacher, ballet master and choreographer. During his training, he completed several internships at the Opera House and later also at the Budapest Operetta Theater , where he was engaged after graduating. At the same time, Dvorak was engaged in performing arts and pantomime. He wrote his own pieces and performed them in the Budapest Metro Club, among others.

In 1969 Dvorak began a two-year musical training in operetta theater in Hungary, where he received lessons from the well-known theater director Vámos László. Upon completion, he was given a leading role, the role of Benvolio, in the Hungarian production of "West Side Story". Engagements for musicals and plays such as “La Mancha” and “Fiddle on the Roof” followed.

In the early 1970s, Dvorak received an offer for a leading position in the industry, but turned it down due to political differences, which also closed the door to further activities in Hungary. This was followed by a year of stagnation. In 1972, after collecting information about the possibilities in the West during a guest performance in Venice in previous years, he decided to go to Germany. For the next two years he accepted an engagement in Augsburg as a solo dancer and training master.

From 1973 to 1976 Dvorak also studied theater studies at the University of Düsseldorf and during this time made contact with the Bavarian Broadcasting Corporation , since at that time he was intensively involved with Far Eastern dance art and ritual dancers. In 1973 he began his pantomime training with Marcel Marceau in Paris, whom he had already met as a guest lecturer in Budapest.

It was a time of reorientation : Dvorak worked for the first time as an artistic advisor at the Stuttgart Ballet, through which he made the acquaintance of John Neumeier and contacted an international artist agency in Frankfurt regarding his future opportunities.

In 1975 Dvorak opened his own school, the Dvorak Ballet School , in Kiel. In 1972 he was a guest at the Olympics in Kiel. Three years later, the establishment of its own pantomime theater "Schwarzlicht" followed , which existed for 28 years. In cooperation with companies from Kiel he trained mannequins and dressman in the 1980s and designed fashion shows in a dance-like manner. He also conducted dance research all over the world, from Easter Island to Cambodia.

In 1982 he attended the American Ballet Center in New York, where he took tap dance lessons from Jimmy Slyde. Through Slyde, Dvorak came into contact with the Dance Theater of Harlem in New York, where he learned jazz and modern dance. He also attended the Vaganova Ballet Academy in St. Petersburg for ballet and repertoire. The Waganowa technique was new and popular at the time. It was learned by all dancers at the Waganowa Ballet Academy.

Activities in the field of dance research, choreography and teaching followed since the 1980s.

In 2015 he met the drummer and music teacher Stefan Bihary. The ISTFAN² theater was created.

Current

Dvorak lives in Kiel and continues his activities in the Dvorak ballet school . There he teaches gymnastics for adults, modern dance for teenagers, tap dance for advanced, jazz dance for adults and children's ballet from 5 years. Adult ballet and pantomime are also possible on request.

An expansion of the Dvorak ballet school to include the ISTFAN² theater , which he founded together with Stefan Bihary, has been in progress since 2015 . The theater offers “a variation from the world of dance, rhythmic life, instrumental fantasy, right through to theatrical reflection on everyday routine”.

The opening of the ISTFAN² Theater in Kiel will take place in May 2018.

Dvorak is still working as a freelancer and artistic consultant for German television .

Trivia

In 1972, during a visit to England, Dvorak met the musician Elton John in a bar while he was playing the piano, and was convinced of his musical future. At the time, Elton John's seventh studio album "Yellow Brick Road" was in the works.

During a stay in Port-au-Prince in the 1970s, he also met Haiti Al Kooper , the co-founder of the band Blood, Sweat and Tears , who lent him his Sony Walkman to listen to his demo tape.

In 1997 Dvorak was invited to a Michael Jackson concert as a VIP guest , where he met the pop star personally. The contact was made through his pantomime teacher Marcel Marceau , who taught Michael Jackson the moonwalk .

“Dancing is medicine for the body and balm for the soul” is a sentence by Anna Pawlowa (1925), who has accompanied Dvorak all his way to this day.

Works & engagements (selection)

• Opera and Operetta Theater Budapest as a solo dancer
• Art Center “Metro” Budapest as a solo pantomime
• Operetta theater Munich
• Theater Augsburg as a solo dancer and choreographer
• Choreography for the operetta "Polenblut" in Augsburg (1973)
• Choreography for Rainer Werner Fassbinder's film “Querelle” (1982) in Augsburg
• Choreography and dancer in the musical "Show Boat" (only white man) in Augsburg
• Choreography for dance scenes in the operetta "Orpheus' Unterwelt" in Augsburg
• Choreography for the German operetta "Vogel dealer" in Augsburg
• 16 choreographies for Sesame Street
• Artistic advisor to the Stuttgart Ballet
• Collaboration with writer, book author, theater director and founder Csemer Geza for script preparation, research and as a co-author
• Collaboration with Hoffi Geza as a choreographer for various positions in the "microscope theater"
• Guest performance at the Theater Trieste Italy
• Guest performance at the City Theaters in Warsaw and Krakow
• Guest lecturer in historical dances at “The Dance Theater of Harlem” in New York at the invitation of co-founder Arthur Mitchell

swell

• "Istvan Dvorak: A Hungarian on the Kiel Fjord: Hollywood had him hooked" by Hartmut Schulz on September 2, 1981 in the Kieler Kurier
• "Pantomime especially excited young people" newspaper article from 1978, published in the Kieler Nachrichten (by jhs)
• "On Saturday in the Rendsburger Ring: Pantomimentheater Schwarzlicht" newspaper article from 1980, published in the Kieler Nachrichten (from lz)
• "Play without words" newspaper article from 1980, published in the Kieler Nachrichten
• “Everyone wants to dance like Carmen: Now comes the Flamenco” newspaper article from 1984, published in the Kieler Nachrichten
• "Istvan Dvorak also says: 'You never stop learning'" newspaper article from 1989, published in the Kieler Nachrichten (from SG)
• https://www.ballettschule-dvorak.de/ official website of the Dvorak Ballet School
• https://www.istfan2.com/ official website of istfan²

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Interview with Istvan Dvorak, 2017
2. ^ "On Saturday in the Rendsburger Ring: Pantomimentheater Schwarzlicht" newspaper article from 1980, published in the Kieler Nachrichten (from lz)
3. ↑ ballet school-dvorak. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on April 6, 2017 ; Retrieved April 4, 2017 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ↑ is-fan2. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on April 5, 2017 ; Retrieved April 4, 2017 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.