The historic materials left behind by British ballet legend Sir Kenneth MacMillan have a new home in London: the Royal Academy of Dance Archive. Earlier last month, Lady Deborah MacMillan gave RAD a treasure trove of artifacts from her late husband, ranging from his 1944 Grade 1 ballet exam certificate to rehearsal photos, off-duty snapshots, personal diary entries, handwritten notes, and letters he kept from dance luminaries like Dame Ninette de Valois.
MacMillan was a founding dancer of the Sadler’s Wells Theatre Ballet (the precursor to The Royal Ballet), but he is most well-known for his impact as a choreographer. His ballets, like Romeo and Juliet, Manon, and Mayerling, are beloved for his expressive use of classical vocabulary to expose the complicated inner lives of the characters. “There is no doubt that Kenneth’s creative genius contributed to the evolution of the art form of classical ballet. He put British ballet on the international map,” Dame Darcey Bussell, RAD president, said in a press release.
MacMillan also served as artistic director of The Royal Ballet from 1970 until 1977, then remained principal choreographer for the company—even during stints as director of ballet at the Deutsch Oper Berlin and associate director of American Ballet Theatre—until his death backstage at the Royal Opera House in 1992.
The RAD Archive, based in the Academy’s Wolfson Library, already contains more than 75,000 artifacts important to the history of British ballet. The staff plans to catalog the new MacMillan collection in 2025, and then make it available to the public.
In a press release, RAD artistic director Alexander Campbell shared that these materials are a boon to anyone craving further insight into one of Britain’s most influential artists, adding: “A visionary choreographer who challenged the status quo and shaped our understanding of what ballet is and can be, the opportunity to gain further understanding about Sir Kenneth and his process is a gift to all.”
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