Der Fall Lander

Around the world, Harald Lander (Photo: Huset Mydtskov) is known as the choreographer of “Etudes,“ a pedagogic demonstration ending in a French style finale. In Denmark, on the other hand, Lander‘s name is linked with scandal: in 1951 he was accused of sexual harassment and forced to flee the country and rebuild his career in Paris. On February 25, Harald Lander would have been one hundred and the Royal Theatre is celebrating his memory by showing the evergreen “Etudes“ once again.

Present ballet master Frank Andersen has never shown any interest in putting other works by Harald Lander back on the stage, although one might have expected some of Lander‘s 1930‘s experiments created in the fertile artistic climate nourished by the so-called “cultural radicals;“ left-wing play­wrights and stage designers including Kjeld Abell and Svend Johansen. Choreo­gra­pher Peter Schaufuss, who is to ballet what airport novels are to literature, presen­ted “Harald,“ an homage at his theatre in Holstebro.
Erik Aschengreen‘s new biography on Harald Lander is a 504 p. weighty volume, full of research into “the case.“ Although Aschengreen is staunchly loyal to his protagonist, the evidence nevertheless ...