Bijan Kalantari
Bijan Kalantari began his dance education at a young age, laying the foundation for a career that would span continents and contribute significantly to the development of ballet in Iran. His journey started as a scholarship student, marking the beginning of a lifelong dedication to the art of dance.
Early Training and International Exposure
Kalantari commenced his dance education in 1947 as a scholarship student at the Metropolitan Opera Ballet School with Margaret Craske, an authority on the Cecchetti method of ballet pedagogy, and the luminary Anthony Tudor. He continued his dance education and practice at the Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance in New York. He danced with the New York City Opera Ballet, Metropolitan Opera Ballet, companies in Philadelphia, Dallas, Kansas, and other regional ballet and opera companies throughout the United States. He was also a guest artist with Puerto Rico Ballet and in Europe at Al Teatro La Fenice in Venice, Italy, where he worked with Bronislava Nijinska (the younger sister of the ballet legend Vaslav Nijinsky) and Serge Lifar, both of whom were star dancers of Les Ballets Russes de Serge Diaghilev.
Contributions to Iranian Ballet
In 1969, he organized “An Evening of Ballet,” a critically acclaimed dance program to present young leading dancers from Germany and the United States at the stage of Roudaki Hall Opera. The following fall season, the 29-year-old Bijan Kalantari, who at the time was working in the United States, moved to Tehran and established a new ballet department at Tehran’s Music Conservatory under the auspices of the Minister of Culture and Arts. From the very beginning, he dreamed of creating an all-Persian ballet company capable of performing worldwide. Kalantari is credited for bringing an efficient ballet training method to Iran. His school existed for six years. He left Iran in 1975 because of being trapped by the bureaucratic machinery at work, despite receiving encouragement at the very top level. By leaving Iran, he also left the dance profession to become a successful businessman.