BALLET IN CROATIA
The beginnings of the Croatian ballet tradition were linked to the mid 19th century Zagreb theatre, but the arrival of a Russian ballerina, teacher and choreographer, Margarita Froman, in 1921, ushered in a new period of development. A plethora of excellent dancers and choreographers emerged from her school, among whom were Mia Čorak-Slavenska, Ana Roje, Oskar Harmoš and Sonja Kastl. The School of Classical Ballet was founded in Zagreb in 1949. The art of ballet was celebrated in the second half of the 20th century by Vesna Butorac-Blaće, Irena Pasarić, Almira Osmanović, Dinko Bogdanić andTomislav Petranović, and particularly by Milko Šparemblek, who danced in the Maurice Béjart Ballet du XXe Siècle ensemble and was Director of the Metropolitan Ballet in New York, the Gulbenkian Ballet in Lisbon and the Lyon Ballet.
Modern dance in Croatia was cultivated in parallel with the emergence of different trends in Europe. From the late 1920s, the following were active in Zagreb: Mercedes Goritz-Pavelić, a student of Mary Wigman and Gertrud Bodenwieser in Vienna and Munich, Mirjana Dragana Janaček, who established her school on the dance expressions of Isadora Duncan, and Ana Maletić, a disciple of the Rudolf Laban school, whose Rhythm and Dance School (1945) still bears her name today. These schools have produced generations of dancers, among whom are some of the founders or members of the best known modern dance ensembles – the Modern Dance Studio, the Chamber Ensemble of Free Dance and the Zagreb Dance Ensemble. The dance scene today is very active, with a major role being played by the international festival Modern Dance Week, which has been organised in Zagreb since 1984.