Introducing the Collections - The Tatiana Bechenova Collection

Tatiana Bechenova (c.1925-2012) was born in Sophia, Bulgaria, daughter of Paulina Belka of Odessa and George Bechenoff of Siberia.  She was raised in Paris and joined de Basil’s Original Ballet Russe at the age of fourteen.  Bechenova performed as a soloist from 1939 to 1947, traveling with the company around the world, including a tour in Australia and a longer sojourn throughout Central and South America.  After leaving Original Ballet Russe, she was a principal dancer for Agnes de Mille in the Broadway production of Carousel.  Following her marriage to Thomas O’Rourke, the couple moved to Dubuque, Iowa.  She taught ballet at Clarke College and opened the Academy of Ballet in 1958.  Bechenova founded the Dubuque City Youth Ballet in 1969 and, with her daughter Marina, established the Heartland Ballet in 1983. 

The Tatiana Bechenova Collection is the largest collection by number of items, although not by linear feet.  With over 900 photographs, her collection provides the most comprehensive picture of the dancers and the travel of the Original Ballet Russe during their sojourn in South and Central America.

Tatiana Bechenova in costume.  

Tatiana Bechenova joined the company shortly before the Original Ballet Russe's final trip to Australia.

Certificate from traveling on the S.S. Monterey from Australia

Train ticket traveling between Sydney and Brisbane in Queensland

Program from Brisbane performance on July 6, 1940.

Tatiana Bechenova on Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia.

Christmas party on the S.S. Orcades on way to Australia in 1939

Her collection also includes the only materials we have related to the company's ill-fated trip to Cuba in 1941. Several of the dancers struck to keep their pay.  However, there was a major blowup between Colonel de Basil and his financier, Sal Hurok.  Due to this, the money to get the dancers  off the island was gone.  The dancers were trapped for several months before they were rescued with a new contract in South America.

Telegram to Tatiana Bechenova regarding the strike.

Roman Jasinsky, Moscelyne Larkin, and Tatiana Bechenova on the beach in Cuba.

Program from Havana in 1941.

Following a brief stint in the US and Canada, the company embarked on a five-year engagement across Central and South America.  The Bechenova collection contains hundreds of snapshots and performance programs from nearly every country in the region.  This collection contains the only large scale groupings detailing the movements of the Original Ballet Russe.

Tatiana Bechenova in front of Sugar Loaf in Brazil.

From the Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, Argentina

Artist's Pass at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City.

July 19, 1942 performance program from Montevideo, Uruguay

November 20, 1945 performance program from San Salvador, El Salvador

Performance program from July 5, 1945 in Caracas, Venezuela

November 10, 1945 performance program from Tegucigalpa, Honduras

They brought ballet in its most unique form to Central and South America as well as being a highlight in Australia.  The Bechenova collection is comprehensive in its materials regarding these somewhat lost years of the Original Ballet Russe.

Olga Morosova and Oleg Tupine in Le Coq d'Or

Graduation Ball, which was first presented in Sydney in 1940

Peformance of Paganini

The Tatiana Bechenova Collection is the most recent major collection donated to the Ballets Russes Archive, and it may turn out to have the most research and historical merit in its coverage of Original Ballet Russe and the South American tour.