He bought the grave years ago in an Amsterdam cemetery. It is sunny and yet protected by impressive trees. Hans van Manen will now move into this final home: the choreographer died on Wednesday at the age of 93, as the Dutch National Ballet, which was closely associated with him, announced late in the evening. The dance world reacts with shock. With van Manen she is not only losing the grand seigneur of the field – a man full of esprit, lifestyle and humor, sometimes prone to cheerful, sometimes bilious storms of temper. Rather, one of its most influential innovators is resigning.
Hans van Manen freed European ballet from the Procrustes bed of tradition and modeled it in neoclassical terms. His creations were crystalline, clear and so sharply defined that no full-length narrative material was needed to tell the core of human nature. About loving, suffering, courtship and desire, seeing and longing. No one will be able to replace this master any time soon.
Van Manen, born in Amstelveen in 1932 as the second son of German-Dutch parents, grew up in poor circumstances. The father died early, the mother had to support herself and her two boys under the German occupation. As his biographer Sjeng Scheijen recorded in 2023, young Hans acquired the necessities of life on forays through Amsterdam’s alleys. Tough years that were detrimental to his health. Nevertheless, in 1946 he was hired as an assistant make-up artist at the Stadsschouwburg, the city theater in Amsterdam. The tap-dip films by Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire did the rest. And the city’s dance-crazy nightlife took care of the rest: in the late 1940s, Hans van Manen took lessons from Sonia Gaskell, a pioneer of the Dutch ballet revival. He joined her ensemble, switched to opera ballet and won the state prize for choreography with one of his first creations.
From 1960 onwards, van Manen worked alternately for the country’s two most renowned companies, the Nederlands Dans Theater, which he co-founded, and the Het Nationale Ballet (Dutch National Ballet). The self-confident newcomer not only gave both of them decisive growth impulses, he also distinguished himself as a reformer, doing away with all the ornaments, with decorative chichi and flourishes of movement. Instead of destroying the classical foundation, van Manen placed dance architecture à la Mies van der Rohe on top of the historical structures. The result of this modernization was a paradox: phenomenal power and fragile delicacy characterized each of his more than 150 works.
Creations like “Five Tangos” or “Live” stormed the international dance hit lists
These include eye-openers such as the web of relationships that the piece “Große Fuge” (1971) creates between men and women in the room, or the rested elegance with which “Adagio Hammerklavier” (1973) encounters Beethoven’s sounds. In 1965, “Metaforen” provided a couple portrait without a lady, which – sensational at the time – entangled two dancers in a pas de deux. Attractions such as “Five Tangos” and “The Old Man and Me” stormed the international dance hit lists – an intimate chamber play between laughter and tears, which, like many Van Manen signature pieces, also found its way to the Munich National Theater. A true stroke of genius is “Live”, conceived in 1979 as a trio: ballerina plus partner plus camera. The arrangement almost prophetically anticipates our permanently performative present and remains stable in the repertoire of many houses.
Until recently, Henk van Dijk, videographer for Het Nationale Ballet and Hans van Manen’s life man, operated the camera. Anyone who saw them together felt an understanding that didn’t require words. Last May, van Manen stood on the stage of the Stuttgart Ballet at the homage “Five for Hans”, accepted an ovation and thanked him in a firm voice. She will be missed from now on. Just like the sight of the recreational smoker who lasted longer at parties than most and knew how to inspire young dancers. With Hans van Manen’s death, nothing less than European modern dance ended. He is mourned worldwide.