The Ballerina Supremacy

Today set a new milestone for our project as I had the great opportunity and pleasure to work with my first male dancer : Wlademir Faccioni.

Wlademir is a first soloist at the Bayerisches Staatsballet. I only knew him from his many stage performances so when Lucie (also part of the project) told me that he was interested in doing pictures for the project, I of course did not hesitate! I mean, the idea of working with not just only female dancers was in a corner of my head since the very beginning of the project. After all, the idea and essence of what we are trying to do is more than just trying to picture pretty girls in pointe shoes. At least I hope this is how it has been perceived so far! The only thing was, I was not sure whether I was ready for it, considering we were just getting started. But when an opportunity like this knocks on your door, I would be a fool to turn it down! I figured I could learn a lot from working with Wlademir.

He contacted me at the end of last year and we met to discuss the whole project and his ideas. He had a really good concept of what he wanted and I knew that he was genuine about it, that what he had in mind also represented who he is, as a person and as a dancer. So we agreed on a first session. Then came the Christmas break and I had to travel for 3 weeks for work in January. In the meantime, a terrible cold wave and snow fall took over Munich. When I came back from my trip it was -17°C (2°F) and the city was white with no sign of improvement for the near future. We had 2 options: wait it out or go with it!

Thankfully, Wlademir decided to go with it! The day this picture was taken it was “only” -5°C (23°F). I should add that Wlademir is from Brazil so he is used to much different temperatures! But we figured that we could use the current weather conditions to our advantage and create some unique images.

It was very interesting working with a male dancer and I learned a lot from this session. I’m exciting at this evolution in our project and I’m looking forward to working with more male dancers!

Here is Wladmir’s bio taken off the Bayerisches Staatsballet page:

Wlademir Faccioni was born in Brazil and was trained in the Munich Ballett-Akademie/Heinz-Bosl-Stiftung. In 2002 he joined the Bavarian State Ballet as an apprentice and became a member of the corps de ballet in January 2003.His repertoire includes Jiří Kylián’s Six Dances and Svadebka, Hans van Manen’s Solo and a prominent part in Itzik Galilis So nah so fern. His first choreography Vivace (on music by Vivaldi) was created in 2004 as part of the State Ballet’s Young Choreographers Programme.He was promoted to a Soloist at the beginning of the season 2007/2008 and dances as a First Soloist since the beginning of the season 2011/12.

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