Catching Up With Li Cunxin

Caption: Li Cunxin, pictured with Queensland Ballet dancer Teri Crilly, will take over from Francis Klaus as the ballet's artistic director, starting in July. Picture: Jack Tran Source: The Australian








This is interesting. Going through old programs, I discovered recently that I saw Li Cunxin perform, once, when I lived in Arizona, around 1988. This was before the big movie (which I wrote about here) came out, of course, and before I quite appreciated his stature:

He was born in poverty in China, became a world ballet star, segued into stockbroking, wrote a best-selling memoir, took on a sideline in motivational speaking and, as of yesterday, is artistic director-elect of Queensland Ballet.

...Li's early life is well known from the international success of his book Mao's Last Dancer, adapted by director Bruce Beresford in 2009. The story ended as he was about to join the Australian Ballet, from which he retired as a principal artist in 1999. Li went on to be a senior manager at Melbourne stockbroker Bell Potter, an AB board member, and a corporate guest speaker. Forty-one candidates vied for the QB job, 20 of whom were Australian and the others from Europe, the US, Africa and New Zealand. QB chair Joan Sheldon cited Li's "extraordinary career, international reputation, networks and commercial experience" as reasons for their choice.

...Li has a four-year contract with QB, but said he was looking forward to "the next five, 10, 15 years" in dance. "This is an opportunity to roll my sleeves up, to do something tangible," he said.