RF5P+7V, Belgrade, Serbia
The future prima ballerina was born in 1899 in Moscow, to Vasily and Zinaida Vener. Later, instead of her German surname, she adopted the sonorous Russian pseudonym – Kirsanova. It must be said that the girl's father was absolutely against her passion for ballet. Only at the age of twelve did he allow her to begin classical dance training, and that was only after Nina, in despair, almost took her own life. Her teachers were Lidia Richardovna Nelidova, Anna Iosifovna Sobeshchanskaya, and Vera Ilyinichna Masolova. Of course, starting pointe work at 12 meant attracting skeptical glances. But even the undeniable idol of that time, the legendary Anna Pavlova, was accepted into the Imperial Theatrical School only at ten. And Nina was no less talented, persistent, and strong-willed than her. And she triumphed!
Kirsanova graduated from ballet school in 1919. She managed to dance on the stages of the Maly Academic Theatre and Zimin's Opera Theatre, but soon, together with her husband, decided to leave the country. They were literally smuggled across the Zbruch River into Polish Lviv by a local smuggler. The fifty gold rubles he received opened a new chapter in Nina Vasilyevna’s life.
For several years, she danced in Warsaw and Bucharest. Kirsanova arrived in Belgrade only in 1923 — she was invited to the Serbian capital by the famous composer and conductor Petar Konjović. The ballerina took this as a sign of fate, since even in pre-revolutionary Moscow, at the end-of-year ballet school performances, she danced Serbian and Montenegrin kolo dances. On November 7, 1923, the Russian ballerina stepped onto the Belgrade stage for the first time. It was at the "Ballet Evening" concert on the stage of the Manege building, where she performed alongside Alexander Fortunato, ballet master of the Lviv Grand Theatre. That same November, the National Theatre applauded her for the first time. Her roles in "Scheherazade," "Walpurgis Night," and "Faust" were so memorably beautiful that on February 24, 1924, the National Theatre signed its first engagement contract with the ballerina.
The Serbian ballet had existed for four years, but only with the arrival of Kirsanova and Fortunato was the first full-fledged production staged – "Coppélia." Nina Vasilyevna possessed enormous work capacity and a vivid temperament. For several years, she was prima ballerina, ballet chief, director, and choreographer all at once. Kirsanova staged 28 choreographies, danced 18 leading roles in ballets, and performed 11 ballet solos in operas.
The 1920s gave Nina another incredible gift — creative collaboration with Anna Pavlova. Before emigration, the star ballerinas had never met. When Nina was taking her first tentative steps on the school stage, Anna was already a prima at the Mariinsky Theatre and had eventually left Russia altogether. When Anna’s troupe toured Belgrade in the mid-1920s, Nina was not in the capital — she was dancing in Buenos Aires at the Colon Theatre.
Fortunately, Anna Pavlova’s partner, Lavrentiy Novikov, knew Kirsanova from ballet school in Moscow. It was he who invited her to join the troupe in 1927. When Kirsanova knocked on the door of the hotel room where the great ballerina lived, Anna herself opened it and immediately noticed the engagement ring on the applicant’s finger. How she scolded Nina for her carelessness: “A ballerina’s career is impossible with a private life; marriage is a huge obstacle. You must devote yourself entirely to art!” Stunned by such an unexpected tirade, Nina, mixing Russian and Serbian words, replied no less passionately: “My husband is the opera singer Boris Popov; we have no problems because we agreed not to interfere with each other’s careers!” The matter was closed. Anna Pavlova immediately cast Nina Kirsanova in several leading roles. The schedule was tough: two to three performances a day, followed by long night rehearsals. Then she toured all over Europe, visited the Middle East and Australia. After Anna Pavlova’s death in January 1931, according to her will, several troupe members gave a concert in Brussels, attended by the Belgian royal couple. When the finale came to the dying swan — Anna Pavlova’s signature piece — the entire hall stood in complete silence for several minutes, thus honoring the memory of the departed legend.
Nina Kirsanova returned to Belgrade. Unfortunately, Milan Predić, then director of the National Theatre, did not favor ballet, considering it merely a necessary evil. Therefore, he treated Nina accordingly — constantly emphasizing that she was no star, but merely an actress necessary to the theatre by fate. Kirsanova had strained relations with Predić in general. The cause was an incident at the very beginning of her Belgrade career. As the "chief" of the ballet troupe, Nina went to the director to discuss raising the ballerinas’ salaries. But he irritably replied: “You know what, if your women want to earn a few more dinars, let them stroll in the evening near the Moscow Hotel or the casino!” Nina flared up and threw the inkwell from the administrator’s desk onto the floor: “I lead the ballet, not a brothel!” she angrily threw at Predić and slammed the door. Because of the conflict with the director, the ballerina accepted any invitations from abroad, going abroad for several months every year to Athens, Vienna, Paris, Milan, and from 1935 to 1937 she even headed the ballet in Monte Carlo.
Nina Vasilyevna met the beginning of World War II in Paris and immediately returned to Belgrade. Here she literally performed a feat — under the most difficult conditions, she managed to preserve the ballet troupe of the National Theatre. Performances continued on the stage of the Manege — the theatre building was severely damaged during the bombing on April 6, 1941. Of course, these were no longer the former luxurious performances, but they were enough to keep in shape. The liberation of Belgrade brought new difficulties. Fearing the arrival of the Red Army, many Russian artists left Serbia. But Nina Vasilyevna stayed, despite possible problems. The only thing she changed was swapping her ballet tutu for the uniform of a nurse in the Allied army, working for eight months in the orthopedic-surgical clinic of Belgrade.
Kirsanova was demobilized in 1946 and, at the invitation of Oskar Danon, returned again to the National Theatre, where she founded a ballet studio. It quickly grew into the State Ballet School. Nina Vasilyevna had 22 students, among whom were future stars — Dušanka Sifnios, Milorad Mišković, Dušan Trninić, Žarko Prebil, and others.
The famous choreographer Vladimir Logunov said that Nina Kirsanova “taught real ballet, not just movements.” She rejected conventions and insisted that one must trust their ballet intuition — the body must follow the soul. The incredible temperament of the mentor was noted with surprise and gratitude by all her students. She knew how to live ballet but did not fill everything around with it, leaving room for other things — both everyday life and hobbies.
During numerous tours, Kirsanova discovered another passion — archaeology. At every opportunity, she visited local museums, wandering for hours through halls dedicated to ancient history, especially Egyptian. Upon retiring in 1961, Nina Vasilyevna enrolled in the archaeology department of the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Belgrade and earned a historian’s diploma. In 1969, she became a master’s degree holder and even wrote a doctoral dissertation but did not manage to complete it. In the Taormina Museum in Sicily, one can still see female figurines she found during excavations — Nina Vasilyevna insisted they were ballerinas.
In August 1984, Nina Vasilyevna gave her last interview. She lamented that she never got to watch either "Something in Between" or the new Soviet series "Anna Pavlova." But she worried most that due to problems with her leg, she could no longer help anyone: “Until last year, I used to go to the National Theatre and the Louis Davicho Ballet School to show some pirouette. But now I can’t…” Nina Vasilyevna smiled shyly. On her wrinkled face, her eyes still shone radiantly and youthful: the heart, mind, and soul of a ballerina were ready for anything, but her body could no longer serve her as before.
The legendary Russian, Yugoslav, and Serbian ballerina quietly passed away in Belgrade on February 3, 1989. She was buried in the Alley of the Greats at the New Belgrade Cemetery. And here is something interesting: the last role performed by Anna Pavlova was the dying swan, and the last ballet staged by Nina Vasilyevna Kirsanova was "Swan Lake." On December 18, 1951, she took the stage for the last time, giving the enthusiastic audience the role of Odile.
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