Relevétions: Virginia Johnson’s Essay from Pointe’s First Issue

This article, written by founding editor in chief Virginia Johnson, was first published in the Spring 2000 issue of Pointe.

For me, pointe was the defining feature of ballet. Yes, there are other aspects—the music, the sense of order, but the act of rising to one’s toes and dancing at that rarefied extreme seemed to me to be what ballet was about. It is a glorious experience, but the struggle to gain the strength and technical ability to have it be a glorious experience can be a long journey. Sometimes you have to dare yourself to get past the fear and pain.

I remember my first relevé. I was 11 or 12 and had been dreaming of putting those shoes on for a long time. I made it up to pointe and then sat right down, undid the ribbons and took off one shoe. Peering into the box, I searched for the razor that was peeling the skin off my toes. Of course, there was nothing there but the bunny pad. (Back then, pointe shoe bunny pads were all the rage for that first pair of “toe shoes.” Bunny pads were made of rabbit fur dyed pink and shaped to fit over the toes and into the box of the pointe shoe for cushioning.) I put the shoe back on and learned to get over a little incidental pain.

I put the shoe back on because the idea of dancing on the tips of my toes was more powerful than the pain; the pain was very little compared to the freedom I imagined. It did not take long for the skin of my toes to toughen (though occasional blisters remained a part of life). Besides, I was lucky to have the stubby toes and strong arch that soon made pointe work a challenging pleasure.

As time went on, my ideal of pointe work changed. I used to cherish the way that new shoes looked. Shiny satin shoes, hard and pink, tapping on the floor as I worked in class—it was a disappointment when the box got soft. The rigid confinement of the shoe seemed to parallel the exactitude of classical technique: To dance on pointe was to find a balance between two opposite elements: freedom and confinement.

But pointe shoes are expensive and wear out too quickly. For those two reasons the pleasure of working in soft pointe shoes was revealed to me. Working on pointe in shoes that are just hard enough to lightly support the foot but are silent when you run across the stage changed the magic. Around the same time, Arthur Mitchell decided to abandon pink tights and pointe shoes for Dance Theatre of Harlem and to have each of us wear shoes and tights that reflected our complexions. Dancing in flesh-colored tights and shoes made me feel for the first time that I was dancing on my toes. The range of expression possible on pointe was extended dramatically.

Soft shoes are not appropriate for everything; some ballets require a crispness of execution that is not possible in “expressive” shoes. Different styles demand that you use your body and feet differently. The second pas de trois in Balanchine’s Agon asks that you shift the center of balance easily and quickly. The feet are strongly active, and a soggy shoe defeats that impulse. In dramatic ballets, the use of pointe work is a function of character: Giselle hops swiftly across the stage on her pointes to signify innocence and youth, whereas Lizzie’s pointe work in De Mille’s Fall River Legend shows the weight of her terrible circumstance—she is earthbound even on pointe.

I enjoyed working in flesh-toned shoes because it made pointe work seem more natural. At that time, ballets that called for white shoes seemed to command greater respect, if only because they drew attention to the use of the feet more than any other part of the body. Glen Tetley’s Voluntaries, Nijinska’s Les Biches, “Liberty Bell” in Balanchine’s Stars and Stripes, each had their special terrors. The last mainly because I learned that dyeing shoes with a liquid—white “Scuff-Coat”—makes them shrink. It was not until I was trying to get through the dress rehearsal in my lovely shrunken white pointe shoes and couldn’t get to pointe and couldn’t roll through to plié—couldn’t dance, in other words—that I learned that shoes have to be stretched with stuffing when they are dyed, or else.

Those white shoes, usually coupled with white tights, made me feel exposed. The black shoes and sheer black tights I wore for Ginastera, on the other hand, made me feel glamorous and in control. Once again, I was free to savor the pleasure of pointe: tiny bourées sweeping across the stage, or the thrill of a piqué arabesque where the entire weight of the body is extended to its maximum, yet balanced over a single point.

Dancing on pointe extends the line and forces the dancer to coordinate her energy in the most efficient way. Lightness and ease are essential, but they are also by-products of the work. Well done, pointe work is beautiful to look at, but only those who do it can know the joy it is to defy gravity on the tips of one’s toes.