ABSTRACT
In this text, I wish to explore the complex reasons behind the marginalisation and invisibility of contemporary dance in Slovenia after World War II. Contemporary dance is a field that enables the analysis of numerous types of cultural and social dynamics – those characteristic of both the local and the international environment. Reflecting on contemporary dance under socialism, the first association that comes to mind would be the unique “disappearance” of contemporary dance: its withdrawal into schools and amateur activities. This happened for a number of reasons, which cannot solely be ascribed to the political climate of the socialist period, as is sometimes too hastily done. Beyond this, I would like to shed light on a unique paradox that reflects the complexity of the cultural situation, as well as on a number of factors that shape cultural dynamics and its content. It needs to be noted that the socialist authorities were in favour of ballet, but simultaneously hindered its modernist tendencies that developed after World War II, first in European and then in American ballet, building on the early twentieth-century avant-garde reforms. Under socialism, ballet also experienced a radical “censorship”; it was “frozen” as a museum of traditional ballet forms and repertoires that did not follow the conceptual modernisation of ballet and can hardly be considered a part of the changes that took place in Europe and then in America in the postwar decades.
