Offstage
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Phantom phacts
"When I was at ballet school, I had one pair of shoes to wear for several months. Those shoes were totally destroyed. When I became a professional, I came to understand the importance of the shoes, which are a principal tool for me." Principal dancer Jun Xia tells about his thoughts on the importance of ballet shoes.
Pointe shoes lift the dancer above the ground, both literally and metaphorically. They are a symbol of the ballerina’s weightlessness and years of intense training. A young dance student is unlikely to forget the moment when she gets her first pair of pointe shoes. It’s a rite of passage that takes her to the next level as a dancer, on her way to a professional career.