Maribel Bover

More than 60 years after its be­gin­nings in 1956, the renowned school of dance in Girona con­tin­ues to open its doors to fu­ture gen­er­a­tions of bal­leri­nas, who prac­tise under the in­struc­tions of Mari­bel Bover. Orig­i­nally founded by her mother, the well-known dancer Rosa Maria Viñals, the school was the en­vi­ron­ment Mari­bel grew up in; thus, it seemed only nat­ural for her to fol­low the same path.

She has spent her whole life study­ing the var­i­ous styles of dance; prin­ci­pally clas­si­cal bal­let, but later also jazz dance, which she her­self in­tro­duced to Girona. Ac­cord­ing to Mari­bel, her great­est chal­lenge will al­ways be the stew­ard­ship of the school. Her in­struc­tion and con­stant ded­i­ca­tion have cre­ated well-versed dancers – some of them tal­ented enough to be ac­cepted into pres­ti­gious acad­e­mies – but above all, Mari­bel val­ues the en­joy­ment all the stu­dents get out of the art. Her son, Guillem Brull, went on to be­come a pro­fes­sional dancer in his own right, hav­ing per­formed in Helsinki, Milan and Zurich, to name a few places. Nowa­days, they both teach at the stu­dio, and to­gether they cre­ate an­nual spec­ta­cles that at­tract par­ents and en­thu­si­asts alike.

Here, Mari­bel and Guillem pose along­side three stu­dents, dressed for bal­let, jazz classes and in cos­tumes worn in their last show, “L’antic teatre de comèdies”.

1. Wall mir­ror. An es­sen­tial el­e­ment in any dance stu­dio.

2. Bal­let bar. Ei­ther portable or fixed to the wall, dancers use this to per­form their day-to-day rou­tines.

3. Tutu. The clas­si­cal bal­let at­tire, there are a num­ber of va­ri­eties. Sim­ple black tutus are used in class to get used to the vol­ume, es­pe­cially when danc­ing in duos.

4. Pointe shoes. Only after years of train­ing do bal­leri­nas start to prac­tice with them, and they are usu­ally re­served for per­for­mances and shows.

5. Bal­let slip­pers, jazz shoes. The slip­pers (usu­ally pink for women and black for men) are used for prac­tise. Jazz shoes are black, and typ­i­cally made of leather.

6. Leo­tard. Of dif­fer­ent colours and shapes, this is the stan­dard class out­fit, both for bal­let and jazz.

7. Dance cos­tume. Worn only on stage, this one rep­re­sents Nikiya, the main char­ac­ter in La Bayadère.

8. Ac­ces­sories. Leg warm­ers, thighs, short wrap skirts or crossover cardi­gans are all com­mon sights in a dance class.

9. Ma­te­r­ial for buns. To make a bal­let bun, the hair is pulled into a pony­tail, and the twisted plait is fixed with bobby pins at the base, se­cur­ing fly­aways with a hair­net.

10. Stool. Ini­tially white, the stool has been in the stu­dio for decades; it’s lit­er­ally part of the room.

11. Resin. To avoid slip­ping on the wooden floors.

12. Music. Dozens of CD’s, for all styles, and a tam­bourine to help the younger stu­dents fol­low the rhythm.

13. Books, dolls. Three-year-olds often need a break.