Would you please pass me my ballet shoes?

I have a little (little) obsession with dance. Ballet in particular. "There is no such thing as a little obsession", I'm sure you would say. Well, I like to believe in moderation, so I keep my obsessions on a tight leash. Otherwise, I might still be trying at age 34 to get into a ballet school, I might still be attempting to clean the bath while practicing my extended arabesque, I might actually and seriously still be considering buying a pair of well worn ballet shoes for the purpose of displaying them on the wall of my bedroom. "Nice conversation piece!" I'm sure you would say. But, since my obsession is only little, I will instead post some breathtaking photos of ballet shoes here. Gentle, poetic, tough, wounded... strong, gracious, well worn...

 

Please send me your last pair of shoes, worn out with dancing as you mentioned in your letter, so that I might have something to press against my heart.  ~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 

 

Dance is the only art of which we ourselves are the stuff of which it is made.  ~Ted Shawn, Time, 25 July 1955

 

 

Dance first.  Think later.  It's the natural order.  ~Samuel Beckett

 

 

And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.  ~Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

 

 

 

Dance till the stars come down from the rafters
Dance, Dance, Dance till you drop.
~W.H. Auden

 

(in order from top - photo credits and via John D. Comito, Ascending Star Dance, Easy Art, Guardian, Silvana Del Bene) 

 

xoxoxo

Comments

[Leigh]

I do have pointe shoes hanging in my room (from whenI was 12). Guests are always surprised to learn that they were once mine.

[nadia]

Gorgeous!

[ipp]

do you want a pair of my old ballet shoes? i have tons of them...

[cgw]

what beautiful quotes and beautiful pictures x