Monday, November 28, 2016
Controversy In Russia Over Holocaust Ice Dance Routine
Pollstar: Tatiana Navka, who is the wife of Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov, and dancing partner Andrei Burkovsky, appeared in Saturday’s episode of “Ice Age” dressed in striped uniforms bearing yellow six-pointed stars and heavily made-up to look bruised and frail.
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4 comments:
I clicked on this article because it interested me greatly; The Holocaust is a dark stain on the history of mankind, but it’s important that the stories of the survivors are told. Art has become a viable way to retell these stories in a powerful, ice dancing included. This is a performance art, so strong visual images and motifs have to be employed. I have no issue with the two performers’ costumes being striped outfits that were worn by those in concentration camps. It’s important to note that the writer of the dance is Jewish, although they did not live through WWII. Perhaps there would have been less outrage if the creative team has consulted actual Holocaust survivors for help in putting their stories to ice dancing. It seems like the people who don’t like this piece want to sweep the entire event under the rug. By refusing to acknowledge the Holocaust and its survivors it is more disrespectful than this dance piece.
I heard about this ice routine and I do think that it is inappropriate to do a dance or ice skating routine that depicts something as horrible as the Holocaust. Those types of events are very sensitive to many people because 6 million Jews were killed. By turning that into an ice skating routine it almost makes it seem like it is a happy time and it was not that bad, when that is clearly not true. I understand that they were trying to pay homage to the Holocaust victims, but doing it on a reality TV show was probably not the best way to do that. That was not a happy time at all and when you dance and look happy while wearing striped uniforms and yellow stars then you are insulting everyone who takes this matter very seriously. The Holocaust is an extremely sensitive subject for Jewish people and anyone else who was affected by it, which other people should respect.
My question here is: did you really run out of all the topics for your ice skating routine so you had to chose a Holocaust one? I understand wanting to pay homage, like Sam said before me, but I don't think that this was the way to go around it. I'd really like to see the choreographer's point of view on why he decided to go forward with this dance. I understand wanting to use an unconventional art form to express your beliefs, but this art form is synonymous with happy winter times and sequined tights, not starving Jewish children getting tear gassed. I'm sure that if I saw it, it would have been very well executed, from the ice skaters point of view, but the medium is all wrong. If this took place in the US, I would say that they have freedom of speech on the matter, but the fact that it happened in Russia makes me worry about what's going to happen to the performers and the choreographer. Are they protected under similar laws?
A memorial pays homage. A museum pays homage. Reading names pays homage. An ice-dancing routine on a reality tv show does not in any way, shape, or form pay homage to anything. If this group actually wanted to seriously make a statement about the terrible reality of the holocaust, they could have done it off the ice or canceled their performance to do a different event instead. It feels like the holocaust and similar atrocities (yes - other genocides have occurred more recently with similar methods and death tolls) are repeatedly glorified on film and television because they are "interesting". Schindler's List and inglorious bastards are both guilty of doing this. Just to clarify - you can have entertainment that seriously tackles the atrocities and raise awareness of the prevalence of similar sentiments in our current society. Ice dance and action movies do not accomplish this. I choose to assume that the message was well-intended, but it needed to be executed in a different art form or through a different platform. This execution just ended up being offensive and crude.
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