Marie Anne de Cupis de Camargo

Franco-Flemish family of musicians active in Brussels and Paris. The most celebrated members were Marie-Anne [‘La Camargo’] (1710-70), a dancer at the Paris Opéra from 1726, who appeared in many important premières including Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie (1733) and who, being the first to shorten her costume skirts to above the instep, influenced the aesthetics and technique of ballet; her brother Jean-Baptiste (1711-88), a famed horseman who extended violin-playing techniques and wrote violin sonatas and symphonies; and their brother François (1732-1808), a cellist in the orchestras of the Concert Spirituel and Opéra, who wrote sonatas, duos and a method for the cello.

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Camargo, Marie (orig. Marie-Anne de Cupis de Camargo;baptized in Brussels, 15 Apr. 1710, d Paris, 28 Apr. 1770). French dancer of Spanish and Italian descent. One of the most famous and influential ballerinas in history. Born the daughter of Ferdinand Joseph de Cupis, the aristocratic Italian who was dancing master in Brussels, she made her debut in Brussels but continued her studies with Prévost and Blondy in Paris and became a member of the Paris Opera in 1726, where she became the first ballerina to exhibit a dazzling and virtuosic technique. On one famous occasion, she executed a sudden improvised solo to cover the gap left when one of her male colleagues failed to show up for his entrée. For eight years she enjoyed a fierce rivalry with the more graceful and poetic Sallé which ended when Camargo retired in 1734 to the country chateau of her lover, Louis de Bourbon, Comte de Clermont. In 1740 she returned to the stage where she spent ten successful years dancing in 78 ballets, and reaffirming her position as queen of the Paris Opera. When she retired in 1751 she was granted the largest pension ever given to a dancer. She was possessed of a brilliant batterie and changed public perceptions about the way women should dance. She performed steps which were hitherto considered the exclusive province of the male—like cabrioles and entrechats—and even shortened the traditional skirt of the ballerina to just above the ankle to facilitate her more daring allegro movements, and to ensure that the public could actually see what she was doing with her feet. She was one of the stars of 18th century ballet, influential in the fashion of the day, and the inspiration for many a culinary creation, including Filet de Bœuf Camargo, Soufflé Camargo, and Bombe Camargo. Petipa choreographed Camargo, a ballet in her honour, in St Petersburg (1872). Enrico de Leva and Charles Lecocq wrote operas about her. In 1930 the Camargo Society was founded in London.

From La Camargo Dancing, Lancret

Marie Anne de Cupis de Camargo (15 April 1710, Brussels – 1770) sometimes known simply as La Camargo, was a French/Belgian dancer.

Her father, Ferdinand Joseph de Cupis, earned a scanty living as violinist and dancing-master, and from childhood she was trained for the stage. At ten years of age, she was given lessons by Françoise Prévost (1680-1741), then the first dancer at the Paris Opera, and at once obtained an engagement as premiere danseuse, first at Brussels and then at Rouen.

She made her Paris debut on 5 May 1726 at the Paris Opera ballet. The production was Les Caracteres de la Danse, in which she was the first woman to execute the entrechat quatre, and she at once became the rage. She introduced innovations, changing from heeled shoes to slippers and shortening her ballet skirt. Every new fashion bore her name; her manner of doing her hair was copied by all at court; her shoemaker — she had a tiny foot — made his fortune.

She had many titled admirers whom she nearly ruined by her extravagances, among others Louis de Bourbon, comte de Clermont. At his wish she retired from the stage from 1736 to 1741, resuming her dancing career from 1741 to 1751. After finally retiring, she received a government pension.

In her time she appeared in 78 ballets or operas, always to the delight of the public. She was the first ballet-dancer to shorten the skirt to what afterwards became the regulation length. Nicolas Lancret painted a famous portrait of her that exists in several versions including works now held at the Wallace Collection, London, and at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (shown right).

A ballet, Camargo, based on the incident when she and her sister Madeleine were abducted by the Comte de Melun in May 1728 was created by Marius Petipa and the composer Léon Minkus for the Russian Imperial Ballet, premiering December 19, 1872 with the famous ballerina, Adèle Grantzow, as Marie Camargo. The work was later revived in 1901 for the Russian Imperial Ballet by Lev Ivanov for Pierina Legnani. After the Russian Revolution of 1917, however, the ballet was never performed again.

References

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.

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