Adam Elmes
When we think of ballet dancers often the image that first comes to mind are women & girls in tutus, but ballet is a medium which requires incredibly talented men into to put on a complete performance. One such man is Sydney-born & now Melbourne based Adam Elmes, who has just been nominated for the 2022 Telstra Ballet Dancer Awards.
Pario recently spoke to Adam about the significance of his award nomination, how he is helping to foster a change in the perception of dance & ballet for men, & his hidden identity as a "gamer".
The Telstra Ballet Dancer Awards are a prestigious annual competition which showcases artists of The Australian Ballet who have shown exceptional dedication, growth and potential over the past year. Unlike many previous years this year's nominees are skewed towards male performers with 3 men & 2 women nominated for the awards which will see the winners of the Rising Star & People's Choice Awards walking away with a combined $40,000 in prize money. Given the prestige of these awards it comes as no surprise that Adam felt extremely honoured to be nominated.
"There a few things in my career where I would feel the need to call my family & say 'guess what just happened?'," explained Adam. "One of those was getting into the Australian Ballet company, another one will be if I make it to principle in the company & the last one was being nominated for the Telstra Ballet Award."
When asked what it would mean to him to win either the Rising Star or People's Choice Awards Adam said, "Honestly either would be amazing because both awards are chosen by people who I admire & respect. The People's Choice is obviously the audience, so having that affirmation from the audience is amazing. The Rising Star Award is chosen by the Ballet & the people from Telstra so that's affirmation from your peers - to be called a rising star by those people is the peak award anyone could be given."
With this year's awards being skewed towards male dancers we wanted to chat with Adam about the preconceptions around ballet, particularly for male performers.
Luckily for Adam he says he didn't have to personally endure a lot of bullying, but he did witness first hand just how tough it could be for a male dancer when his older brother was bullied "pretty intensely."
"My older brother, who is a huge role model for me, got pretty intensely bullied for dancing," recalled Adam. "That weighed pretty heavily on me because ultimately he started doing ballet classes just because I needed more guys to help fill out the class so that we could have an all boys class. I felt a little bit of guilt about that so I had to make sure this is worth it & now I dance for my family & my brother."
Despite the ridicule that male dancers face Adam encourages all men to "embrace who they are".
Platforms like TikTok are also helping to normalise dance in Australian culture according to Adam.
"TikTok is a chaotic social media website but it's a lot of fun," he says. "I love seeing guys express themselves, move their bodies, smile & just be themselves."
Whilst dancing has been in Adam's blood for his entire life & makes up a large part of his identity he has also come to terms with a new identity recently. Adam revealed to Pario that he has now come to terms with calling himself a "gamer".
"I've always loved video games... Gaming gets a bad wrap but socially I love to game with friends, which extends beyond video games to board games and card games as well, I just love a good games night."
As he looks ahead beyond the Telstra Ballet Dancer Awards Adam simply hopes that we're "coming out the woods" now & he can finally begin to explore the world though his dancing.
"COVID hit right at the beginning of my career & right as I finished school. Usually you'd finish school & travel either with a company locally or overseas but because of COVID I have done zero travelling. Hopefully once everything subsides you'll see the Australian Ballet going everywhere."
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