In the five years since Final Bow for Yellowface’s inception, the organization has made significant strides in furthering the conversation around Asian representation onstage. But founders Phil Chan and Georgina Pazcoguin realized more needed to be done to organize as a community.

For five years now, Final Bow for Yellowface has been working to rid ballet of offensive Asian stereotypes. But the organization’s goals have always gone deeper than simply updating costumes or makeup. “It’s about what is Asianness onstage—who is given authority, what is considered ‘high art’? And how that translates to the daily lives of […]

At the heart of Marius Petipa’s 1877 ballet La Bayadère is the tragic heroine Nikiya, an Indian temple dancer, or bayadère, whose extreme vulnerability renders her death all the more devastating. Nikiya is a servant to her temple. She is expected to obey the High Brahmin and the Rajah. She arrives when summoned and dances […]

As conversations in the ballet world about race and representation have opened up in the past few years, its most beloved holiday tradition, The Nutcracker, has come under scrutiny as well. Last year New York City Ballet made changes to its second act Chinese Tea variation, removing elements of racial caricature from both the costume […]