Li Cunxin’s Queensland Ballet to tour China
THE Queensland-based ballet icon whose memoir became a Hollywood movie is returning to his home country for a history-making tour.
Confidential
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QUEENSLAND Ballet’s first tour to China later this year will stir up some memories for the company’s artistic director Li Cunxin.
Once upon a time Li would have been arrested when he touched down there.
After all Li, 57, artistic director of Queensland Ballet, famously defected to the West from Communist China in 1981 while at the Houston Ballet in the US.
His Chinese citizenship was revoked.
He told his story in the best-selling memoir Mao’s Last Dancer, which later became a hit Hollywood film.
Recently the Museum of Brisbane mounted an exhibition about the former ballet superstar’s life.
In the decades since his defection his relationship with China has been resolved, so he is in no danger of being apprehended when he and the ballet company he is making famous land in China late this year.
They will be there for performances of their acclaimed production of British choreographer Liam Scarlett’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Shanghai (Queensland’s sister state), Suzhou, Beijing and Xi’an.
“We’re so proud to be representing Queensland on the world stage,” Li said.
“We certainly have global aspirations as a ballet company and this is the next step in us achieving that aim as we present the work of Liam Scarlett who is himself an internationally acclaimed choreographer.
“It will be emotional for me because that’s where my ballet journey started. So it will be very special, and I’m trying hard to contain my excitement.
“I have a good relationship with China now. My parents were allowed to visit me in America in 1986, and ever since then I have been going back to China. I was there visiting family last year.
“I don’t have Chinese citizenship any more though. China won’t allow dual citizenship.”
His production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream is captivating, transcends cultural barriers and highlights the wonderful versatility and technical ability of our dancers.”
The first performance will be at the Shanghai City Theatre on November 9.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk will officially announce Queensland Ballet’s China tour this morning.
The company will perform interstate in Melbourne later this year, and has performed overseas in London in 2015 and the Premier said it was good to see the company on the international stage again.
“It is especially wonderful that this time the company is performing in the birthplace of its acclaimed artistic director,” Ms Palaszczuk said.
“What a thrill for Li and what an experience for his dancers.
“I know they are all looking forward to this opportunity to raise further awareness, and appreciation of Queensland’s premier ballet company and to forge closer ties with the Shanghai Ballet Company while they are there.”
It will be soft diplomacy, and the Premier said it would strengthen Queensland’s ties with the Asia-Pacific.
The ballet will participate in events hosted by the China International Import Expo and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade while there.
As a boy, aged 11, Li Cunxin, was plucked from poverty in rural China in 1972 by Madame Mao’s cultural advisers to attend the Beijing Dance Academy, where he spent seven years.
As a young dancer he was offered a scholarship to study at the Houston Ballet’s summer school, and after his study he defected.
He married a fellow dancer, Elizabeth Mackey, in a bid to stay in the US but was held in the Chinese consulate in Houston and threatened by Chinese authorities.
But after negotiations and intervention by then president George H.W. Bush he was allowed to stay in the US.
The marriage to Mackey ended in 1987 and then Li married a Queenslander (fellow dancer Mary McKendry), eventually joined the Australian Ballet in Melbourne and then worked as a stockbroker before taking over Queensland Ballet in 2012.
He has turned our state company into a national powerhouse and can now show off his pride and joy in his homeland.
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