ABSTRACT
The impact that Sergei Pavlovich Diaghilev (1872–1929) exerted on modern art and fashion, and especially on their connections, is inestimable. Yet, knowledge about this impact and the person of Diaghilev is amazingly minimal. Diaghilev is best remembered as the legendary impresario of the Ballets Russes, which took Paris by storm in 1909, with the incomparable Vaslav Nijinsky as its main dancer, and then produced a series of performances with contributions by Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Eric Satie, Picasso and Matisse, which radically transformed our image of ballet. Diaghilev was also a notoriously controversial character owing to his dictatorial style and his lavish expenses, by which managed to squander all the money gained by his spectacular successes, and the series of controversies within and around the ballet, not least because of his outspoken homosexuality, which was highly unusual at that time.
