Mikhail Baryshnikov , 和Nureyev一样，来自俄国的著名舞蹈家， 上个世纪70年代在西方寻求政治避难
1948年1月28日出生于拉脱维亚的Riga, 父母都是俄国人，父亲工程师，母亲是裁缝,在第二个录像中他说到他的母亲酷爱音乐和艺术，是个;歌剧迷， 音乐迷， 戏剧迷，芭蕾舞迷，一天他母亲把带到舞台前，帷幕打开，音乐响起，他看到的是芭蕾舞，从此与芭蕾结缘一生， 12岁那年Mikhail Baryshnikov 被他母亲送去芭蕾学校学芭蕾，悲哀的是他的母亲同年自杀了。
遇到芭蕾恩师Pushkin，影响了他后来对艺术的态度： 不仅热爱俄罗斯文化艺术，而且对艺术永远保持好奇和探索。
他的舞姿非常优美帅气，而且后来还是一位出色的电影演员，Mikhail Baryshnikov 被称誉为是一位完美的舞蹈家， 他却谦虚地说：完美只是理论上的， 或者说完美是一个神话， 人不可能完美，但可以每天在日常生活里力求做更好，并做些有意义的事， 他说 他的身体就是乐器，他是一名人类公民Citizen of Humanity，人道公民。
确实，这40多年Mikhail Baryshnikov 做的也是一个人道公民做的，保护人类遗产，传播艺术，人道与和平。
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Mikhail Baryshnikov: Perfection Is A Theory
You’d think the greatest dancer in history would be a perfectionist.
Heralded by longtime New York Times critic Clive Barnes as “the most perfect dancer I have ever seen,” Mikhail Baryshnikov led the Kirov Ballet until 1974 when he defected to join the world’s premier dance companies and study under masters George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins.
He has won the National Medal of Honor, the French Legion of Honor, and multiple Emmys. But the 64-year-old Latvian expat waffles if you ask him about being perfect.
“Perfection is a theory,” he says. He’s sitting in the back of an art gallery in the Flatiron District, there to host the opening of his new photo series Dance This Way and celebrate the debut of a video he made with the denim brand Citizens of Humanity. “It’s a kind of astronomical detachment—it’s infinity.”
The man looks trim and strong enough to suggest otherwise. Since leaving his post as artistic director of the American Ballet Theatre in 1989 he has distinguished himself in dozens of creative projects and film and TV work (the most notable for casual fans: Sex And The City). In 2005 he opened the Baryshnikov Arts Center as a way to cultivate local and international artists.
It’s a commitment that explains why Citizens founder Jerome Dahan choose Baryshnikov as the first subject of his yearlong video series—Baryshnikov is as devoted to dance as Dahan is to denim. “I am very passionate about this,” says Dahan, who also founded Seven jeans. “I design for tomorrow.”
The series will feature 20 artists and creators discussing what drives them and how their work contributes to experiencing humanity. New subjects and videos will be released monthly accompanied by a limited edition t-shirt from each contributor.
Baryshnikov, for one, says dance is rightly placed at the forefront of such an effort. He alternately called it “divinity,” the “sport of the gods,” an “activity of the human spirit.”
Which is exactly why it doesn’t serve dancers well to judge themselves obsessively against an unattainable concept, he adds. Art is a process toward self-betterment. Thinking otherwise will only make you crazy.
“Art when your heart is burning but your mind is cool–that is the best combination,” Baryshnikov says. “When they are both burning, it goes nowhere.”
http://www.forbes.com/sites/hannahelliott/2012/10/02/mikhail-baryshnikov-perfection-is-a-theory/
