Nili Glazer – SIBA exec. Director
Nili, born and raised in Israel, studied art at the Avni Academy in Tel Aviv. During her studies she worked at the Kameri Theater as an Assistant Stage Designer at the Kameri Theater as an Assistant Stage Designer.
After her studies Nili decided to widen her horizons
and traveled extensively all over the world for 12 years, working as a freelance artist, designer and consultant, after which she settled down in Copenhagen, Denmark. In the past 20 years Nili exhibited her art work in over 100 galleries and art centers in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, England and Germany, as well as her own gallery in Denmark as well as working on stage design for different ethnic shows.
Nili has been working with Keshet Chaim Dance Ensemble Los Angeles since 1992, designing and creating the company’s costumes and accessories. In Denmark she works mainly with computer graphics and web design and as a freelance costumes and stage designer.
In the past 6 years Nili has been organizing various workshops for dancers all over the world, her work included finance consulting, organization setup, supervising and recruiting of teachers and dance students. Her main workshop is the SIBA Salzburg International Ballet Academy, which she started in 2005 with Peter Breuer, artistic director of the Salzburg Ballet. SIBA became an overnight success and is considered one of the most desired summer workshop for ballet dancers from all over the world.
In addition, in 2007 Nili established the SIBA Ballet Academy Salzburg together with Artistic director Peter Breuer and is the director/owner of EDAS – European Dance Art Salzburg creative summer workshops all over Europe.
Nili Has been living in Salzburg since 2006.
DOTA: Describe your work with the SIBA Ballet Workshop?
NG: One of my close and oldest friends is Yehuda Maor (previously from Bat Dor Ballet). He was working with Peter Breuer, the artistic director of the Salzburg Ballet. Very quickly he realized that things were running in a chaos, No one knew where anything was, and that they need someone to put an order in the ‘Balagan’. So he called me. I was in Copenhagen at the time, and he invited me to Salzburg to ‘take a look’. While I was taking a look, we came up with the idea to create a summer workshop for ‘finishing’ ballet dancers, who actually finished their study, but had not yet had any stage experience. They’d therefore find it difficult to be accepted at any ballet company (it’s a catch 22). From talk to doing, which is my specialty, we put together SIBA – Salzburg International Ballet Academy, and had a fantastic success last year with 57 international dancers. We found an old beautiful boarding school on top of a mountain in the middle of the city, which was closed for the summer vacation, and rented the entire estate there. This year, I am happy to say that we already have over a 100 international students from 18 different countries, (we gave scholarship to 5 ballerinas from Israel). We have planned 4 Gala shows at the end of the workshop in Salzburg, Munich and St. Johann, and look forward to an amazing summer with very famous teachers, and coach star Cynthia Gregory. We still have a few beds for a few ‘late arrivals.
NILI – SIBA FACEBOOK
NILI LIFE STORY
The bio is a live interview with Connie Katz. with a lot of information about dance costumes production and design.
Versatile Nili Glazer designs and creates theater and show costumes for the Los Angeles Israeli Dance Ensemble Keshet Chaim, including several show groups in Copenhagen and in Israel, and the SIBA – Salzburg International Ballet Academy workshop. Her passion for her work and her ingenuity and natural talent, have led her to discover a world rich in color, texture, and visual and dramatic abundance. Daughter Of The Arts caught up with Nili in Salzburg in the midst of her busy schedule to bring you this exclusive interview.
DOTA: Describe the Avni Academy in Tel Aviv? What classes did you take?
NG: I was accepted to Avni when I was 16; all the other students were there after their army service (20 years and up). Avni was a small art school then but with great teachers. I studied drawing, oil painting, model figurative and sculpture for 4 years (with a break for the army in the middle).
NG: My home those days in Tel Aviv was the Bohemia cafe Kassit, where all the artists, journalists, and writers were sitting. I was there every day in between work and Avni. One of them arranged for me to work at the Kameri at night. I was the little assistant to Adriana Neuman, the assistant of the stage designer those days. She taught me everything, and I mean EVERYTHING about theater, costumes, stage requisites, papie mache, how to use the same carpet for 40 different shows by spray painting it, and the main contribution was she taught me how to do Batik painting. It later became my door opening to the exhibition world. My first exhibition in Denmark was 90 batik paintings that were sold in one day!!!
DOTA: Where were some of the places you explored during your 12 years of traveling after working with Kameri? What did you experience?
NG: After a short marriage (2 years) in Israel, a divorce, and a baby boy (Michael) I decided that I had enough, and needed to get out of Israel, or I will end up in an institution. I sold everything I had for pennies, bought a one-way ticket for Michael and me to New York, with one suitcase and no regrets. Adriana was in Manhattan at that time and said she would help me get settled. After 2 days I found an apartment, a job as a travel agent, and a full day kindergarten for Michael. I stayed in New York City for 5 years, with a lot of travel in between, mostly to Europe. Old cities, history, and the old artists always fascinated me. Then, suddenly, a terrible thing happened. Adriana had an accident in Central park. While riding her bike, she fell down and died on the spot.
Since then, New York lost its charm and I needed to get out of there. I was still working as a travel agent and doing batik and art part time. I decided I wanted to get as far away from NY as possible, and found Hawaii. I stayed there for almost 3 years. Michael was about 10 years old and wanted to go to Israel, so we went back to Tel Aviv, for one year. I couldn’t find myself there anymore; I guess I had changed a lot since I left. Luckily I got an invitation to do a batik exhibition in Stockholm Sweden. I left Michael with his grandmother (not MY mother, God forbid) and flew to London, (cheapest flight those days, 1980), then the ferryboat to Denmark, where I wanted to travel by train to Stockholm to see the country. On the ferryboat I met a Danish couple, who were very interested in art; they asked to see the roll of batiks I had with me. They invited me to stop at their home in Denmark, which was on the route to Stockholm, so I did. On the weekend that I was there, they invited about 50 friends to see my batiks, which they hung on the wall paper with sewing pins, and sold ALL my batiks at hysterical prices !!!
So now I am standing in a little town in Jutland, with no pictures, on the way to an exhibition. My host called the Stockholm gallery and told them the story and postponed my exhibition by 2 months. In the meantime I stayed in their summerhouse. They drove me to Germany to buy every thing I needed to paint a new exhibition, and fed me and took care of me for the whole time. And I thought, if I sell so good in Denmark, why not stay here? And so I did!!!! I moved to the city Copenhagen, found myself a studio, learned Danish in one month at a ‘sing-a-long’ piano bar, and brought Michael there also after a while.