Polina

by Bastien Vivès

Très douée pour la danse, la petite Polina Oulinov est sélectionnée pour suivre les cours de Nikita Bojinski, un maître d’une exigence absolue, à la fois redouté et admiré.
Au fil de son enseignement, qu’elle suit des années durant, Polina devenue jeune fille développe avec son mentor une relation complexe, entre antagonisme et soumission – et finit par le quitter pour explorer de nouvelles expériences artistiques, en toute indépendance. Plus tard, devenue vedette internationale dans sa discipline, la jeune femme prendra toute la mesure de sa dette à l’égard de ce maître aussi difficile que lumineux.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Bande Dessinée, France, Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics, Contemporary

214 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2011

About the author

Bastien Vivès is a Parisian who has drawn or collaborated on more than a dozen graphic novels since his published debut in 2006, including most recently The Butchery (Fantagraphics, 2021). The Angouleme Comics Festival granted Vivès the “Revelation” Award in 2009 and the prize for best series in 2015.

Reviews

[Seth T. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had sat down to write a review of Bastien Vivès’ Taste of Chlorine, a beautiful book that dances around the skirts of a public pool, exploring a relationship that develops amongst swimmers in that place. I had already finished my opener, a minor discussion of the wonder and mystery of language—of how we make ourselves known in the murk of the unknown. And then another book arrived on my doorstep, a package from Amazon UK. I hadn’t been expecting it so soon. It was publisher Jonathan Cape’s latest release from the author of the book I was at that moment reviewing. The book was Bastien Vivès’ Polina, and all hope of me finishing my Taste of Chlorine review that night was wholly evaporated.



In September 2013, I returned from the Small Press Expo galvanized. In the midst of those gathered hundreds of artists and writers who had actually created wonderful and intricate works of comics art and story, I found myself compelled by the need to create one myself. I knew I didn’t have the time or confidence to do anything of real length so I thought I might try putting out a couple mini-comics. And who knows? Maybe that’ll help me better appreciate the form for my reviews? That’s what I was telling myself. But really, I wanted to build something substantial. Something, perhaps, great. In the back of my head and heart, I wanted to create a full-length graphic novel about classical dancers. Ballerinas, if you will. I have four astounding friends who are professional ballet dancers, scattered around the North American continent. Seeing them work so hard and struggle and succeed and stumble and rise is inspiring. I knew there was a fascinating story there. (I even doodled up some little sample art.)



And then, in the middle of September, I saw on Zainab Akhtar’s site a news bulletin alerting readers to the English translation of Bastien Vivès’ Polina, a book concerned with the life of a Russian ballet dancer. Akhtar included some few page samples. I was floored. They were beautiful. I didn’t even have time to be upset that someone had beaten me to my half-formed zygote of a dream. I was too excited. I was only angry to find that the book wouldn’t be released in English until January (and in America, who knows?).[1]

My excitement, as should be plain by the fact that I’m foregoing my Taste of Chlorine review, was well-justified. I had expected something good. I had even expected something beautiful. I had not, however, expected a work as accomplished and perfect as Polina.



The first thing a reader will notice is Vivès’ illustrations. His figures are compositions of gestures, scaffolded together by the merest hint of connection. Thin lines and black blobs of ink dance across the canvas of each panel, outlining a space that I fear to paint too breathlessly. I’m very conscious of myself here and exerting considerable force on my need to wax eloquent in praise of what exactly Vivès does. His artwork is spare and organic. What appears on the page is often either ephemeral or fantastically dense. His layouts and choice of subject feel in every instance to be The Right Choice. He tells his story visually with such great aptitude that I cannot imagine this story being better served by any other illustrator.

Sorry, there I go breathless again. I can’t tell the difference between objective praise and subjective adulation anymore, so please forgive me and read that into my review.



In a book about dancers, perhaps the one great question is how well Vivès captures the flow and sublimity of the human form and the precise gracefulness required of it in the dance. I can’t say whether or not his work comes easily, but because Vivès conveys his subjects’ lithe and supple movement so naturally, his illustrations appear effortless. It helps that his style here is closer to impressionistic than realist; that allows him to focus on exhibiting his intent rather than working counter to purpose by getting lost in details. And while Vivès will occasionally fill his backgrounds with intricated set designs, he still more often provides either no background at all or only the merest fragile skeleton of a setting for his characters. This permits his dancers to float in negative space, buoyed in an elegant frame of nothingness. They are the subjects and they communicate with their bodies even apart from the context of the spaces they would actually be inhabiting. It’s a powerful technique and does much to lend weight to the presence of his actors.

Vivès’ story is lively and important—in the sense that any time we follow a child through to adulthood, the movements that carry her along must be of great moment. And nearly every page of Polina works to this end. Every moment is of moment. Every moment is a work of art.



At about the halfway point a friend relates a maxim to Polina, a little something that carries him through: “Dance is art. There is no opponent and no partner.” Polina, as Vivès presents her, is herself art. She is in every instance an artistic effort, a creative impulse intended to convey a creative impulse. Her carriage is practiced, her posture intentional. Bojinsky, the imposing figure who instructs Polina from her childhood, reminds that “The audience must see nothing except the emotion you are conveying. If you don’t show them grace and lightness, they will only see effort and strain.” Of her own intention or merely by Vivès fateful hand, Polina’s every appearance is an exploration of her teacher’s admonition. Vivès is intent on pushing tremendous readability into every panel. We know Polina’s thoughts by her look, by her face, by the way her body hangs in the space she occupies. We know her relationship to those around her by Vivès’ use of positioning and body language.



In Polina‘s climax, Vivès redirects wholly our perception of things through a few panels in which he temporarily alters a character’s depiction—and in so doing, reveals the facade of so much of what we’ve already seen. It was a bravura moment. Vivès, without fanfare, turns so much of everything on its head and through a simple artistic decision gives the reader a lovely kind of insight into Polina and how her world has been composed. That single juncture of art and story elevated a very strong work to the level of greatness.[2]

Concerning realism, I feel as though Polina is nearly entirely believable. I haven’t yet been able to consult my friends to see how much comports to their own experiences, but from what I do know, Vivès keeps our feet firmly planted in the world of dance as it is or may be. There was only a single moment in the book’s final act that felt perhaps a little too contrived, a little too convenient. All the same, I didn’t mind the strange twist of fate described because I found the rest of Vivès’ story so winning, his heroine so fascinating. I was happy for the opportunity to see her involved in a new circumstance, no matter how surprising, simply for the fact that it would give one more window into her soul. Or at least into the art of her existence on the page, specially prepared for the audience Vivès delivers to her.[3]



Polina is a book about perception and appearance. The world as it is and the world as we see it and the world as we present it. Polina is about beauty and distress. Polina investigates, by charting a small dancer’s path to womanhood, the way the choices we make inform not only our circumstances but the manner in which we see those circumstances. It’s rare to find a tightly woven narrative that simultaneously gives its story the chance to breathe, but Polina does that. Nothing, not even the emptiness, feels as excess. All of it is present for its purpose, but Polina introduces us to the idea that being governed by a fate and destiny (as all stories are) doesn’t have to feel constrictive.
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[Review courtesy of Good Ok Bad.]
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Footnotes
1) And yes, I am that entitled sort of reader who demands that every book be continuously and presently available on the off chance that I will want it that week. It kills me to have to wait for wonderful things. I have no patience.

2) It’s still very early in 2014, but I’m greatly looking forward to any book this year that is more magnificent or special than Polina. Because that book will be amazing.

3) i.e. you and I and every other reader.

[Fátima Linhares · Rating 4 out of 5]

Neste livro, ali até à pagina 100, parece que não há grande história, que não acontece nada de especial. Polina dança, sente-se dividida entre o estilo clássico e o contemporâneo, até que, uma desilusão a faz mudar completamente o foco. E é quando isso acontece que ela se encontra e descobre o que a realiza enquanto bailarina e também enquanto mulher. Não foi um livro que me despertasse grandes sentimentos, mas tem um final que demonstra como alguém nos pode marcar tanto durante o nosso crescimento, mesmo sem se ter apercebido.

[Sam Quixote · Rating 2 out of 5]

Polina joins an elite ballet school as a young girl taught by the demanding Professor Bojinsky. She becomes an accomplished dancer but, when she goes travelling, she discovers that there are many other forms of dance. She goes on to become a famous international dancer.

This is a really insubstantial story to make a 200 page book out of! A dancer’s life could be interesting (I suppose?) but not like this. Watching Polina become a good ballerina, falling in love for the first time, discovering that – shock! – your first love is rarely your last, and then finding her place in an international dance troupe was beyond boring.

Bastien Vives’ artwork is ok but it looks exactly like he sat in a dance studio and sketched the dancers – most of the book looks like it was made up of sketchbook pages. And he can’t convey “amazing” dance very well either. We see the different stages of a dance but there’s no sense of the stages synching up in any meaningful way. We’re told the dances are moving and powerful but all I saw on the page was static non-sequiturs.

And then there’s Polina herself. Her “journey” discovering that there were other ways to dance – what?!? The banal revelation makes more sense when you realise she was a brain-dead drone with zero personality who just did whatever her teachers told her to do. There was nothing about her character or story that was remotely interesting or moving. “I want to dance a new way!” “Boo hoo, I can’t dance this way!” etc. etc. Give me a break!

When the book suddenly interrupts with a “3 Years Later” page and Polina’s suddenly an internationally feted dance superstar, I laughed because It’s all so contrived. We don’t see anything on the page or in the story to suggest how this could have happened, we’re simply told to believe that’s what’s happened. She meets some dance dudes in Berlin, smash cut to 3 years later and everything’s gone swimmingly! Well, show don’t tell, Bastien. In this book, despite the good balance between silent and dialogue driven panels, there’s a lot of telling.

I liked Bastien Vives’ last book, A Taste of Chlorine, but Polina was a completely unbelievable and badly plotted story with dull characters and overly stylised art.

[Ricardo Silvestre · Rating 4 out of 5]

Esta foi uma leitura que me surpreendeu pela positiva.
Inicialmente a trama parecia não ir ter a nenhum lado específico mas acabou demonstrando, pouco a pouco, quão importantes podem ser certas pessoas com quem nos fomos cruzando ao longo da vida.

Ainda que nunca tenha estudado dança, este livro fez-me viajar até à minha época de escola, mais concretamente até junto de alguns professores que se mostraram rígidos em primeiras abordagens mas que se tornaram verdadeiras referências mais tarde. Tanto que ainda me lembro deles, a professora de inglês do quinto ano e o professor de matemática dos oitavo e nono anos. Não tenho, porém, certezas do quanto que me influenciaram em decisões que já tomei e que ainda irei tomar mas tenho a certeza que retive algo de ambos. E se algo ficou comigo e me ajudou a tornar na pessoa que sou hoje, então sim, acredito que me tenham influenciado algures no tempo.

O desenho, em tons de preto e branco, acompanha o desenrolar da trama com a delicadeza que lhe é merecida. Há muitos momentos de silêncio, sem falas, mas não soam a alturas onde não se sabe o que dizer. Parecem, sim, momentos de introspecção onde os pensamentos têm possibilidade de voar mais alto. É uma leitura inicialmente lenta que vai crescendo e acaba tornando-se numa história bastante enternecedora.

[Ocean · Rating 5 out of 5]

No words can describe the pure poetry that is this graphic novel. Stunning!

[Bob Fish · Rating 5 out of 5]

J'adore.

[Pierre Kilmister · Rating 5 out of 5]

Me ha parecido muy interesante con un estilo de dibujo muy personal. Una bonita historia que muestra el amor y el eterno agradecimiento a quienes nos han enseñado.

[Katie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Graphic novel about a ballerina.

Story doesn't flow, and pictures are so minimal in their content, they cannot add anymore information.

The pictures were bad - Polina's nose is always black so it looks skull like and I couldn't always identify the other characters or what was happening.

[am · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolument sublime.

[fer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vou ser sincera, até mais da metade desse livro eu estava pensando em dar umas 3 estrelas no máximo, não tinha me conectado com os personagens e nem muito com a história.

Mas na segunda parte da história me emocionei demais e não estava esperando.

Achei genial a forma como a ilustração despiu o professor Bojinski na metade final do livro. Você passa o livro inteiro vendo ele ilustrado como uma figura com barba e óculos, sem muitos traços faciais além desses, acho que propositalmente para ilustrar como ele era um professor rígido e talvez até distante. Até esse momento no final que ele tira os óculos e você consegue ver os traços faciais dele e perceber que ele é um velhinho na verdade, que a barba é branca e não preta e cheia. Achei GENIAL.

O final traz uma doçura toda pra historia, "virei meu voto" pra 5 estrelas em 45 do segundo tempo ksksksksk

[Fantastiškų KŽL · Rating 4 out of 5]

https://knyguziurkes.wordpress.com/20...

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are some books that you really read and become immersed in the story, its world, its characters... This is one of it. An example of fine French art and story telling.

It follows the life of a Russian ballet dancer - from the first page when she is a tiny beginner apprehensive about getting into the dance school, to the final page, an adult performer world-renowned and living in Paris - and her relationship with her dance mentor Bojinsky.

The art is so simple, but of the best kind, where each stroke of the pen suggests details that not even the most intricate line work can deliver. Despite its simplicity, the drawings betray the mastery of the artist when it comes to human emotions, anatomy, architecture and city-scape.

Read it even if you're a comics fan. It belongs in the class of good literature.

[Olavia Kite · Rating 5 out of 5]

My husband gave me this book as a prize for having attended adult ballet class eight times. We read it together on a train from Düsseldorf to Berlin. I loved everything about it! (Except for the lettering in the English edition, and parts of the translation that didn't sound too natural.) I loved how the bodies flowed in swift brushstrokes, the simplicity of the drawings that conveyed so much. And the faces! The expression was so vivid. This book was a complete delight.

[Claire Admiral · Rating 3 out of 5]

★★★☆☆ 3.25 stars

"Le darò un consiglio per l'audizione al teatro, Polina.
Le persone trovano sempre delle motivazioni, prima di agire.
Non esistono buone o cattive motivazioni, solo chi cerca scuse per non agire ha già perso.
Lei è l'unica ad aver bisogno di sapere cosa la spinge a passare l'audizione".

[Ana · Rating 3 out of 5]

Não posso dizer que me tenha deslumbrado... Não gostei especialmente do traço, que achei irregular, e nem sequer particularmente expressivo. Preferi a história, e por essa razão, talvez ainda venha a revisitar o autor.

[Vanessa Menezes · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was excited to read this one but it was kind of disappointing. The illustrations were more like sketches. And the story felt rushed and occasionally leaped forward in time without any reference in the story.

[Alberto Martín de Hijas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Leí este libro hace unos años y no me gustó nada, pero en la relectura lo he disfrutado mucho. El estilo de Vivès no siempre me entra, pero me ha encantado la relación de Polina y Bojinski.

[Evalunasylva · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adorei!

[Sandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un retrato del mundo del ballet a través de la vida de una bailarina con sus más y sus menos.

[Miruna Caragheorgheopol · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was part of a french-graphic-novel gluttonous binge I went on recently, and I must admit that at 2 a.m. I am more easily impressionable than usual. However, I loved the mood of the book unconditionally: the inky sketchy flowy trait, the flowing structure that only seems to hit an ever-so-slight wrong note in the "3 years later" final part, the flowing plot that is an understated and minimal rendition of the coming-of-age of a ballerina. Pretty much everything is flowing. Even the major plot points are flowing.

Flow aside, this is not a very dense book. It is a 200 pages tome that one can finish well within 2 hours. Even the main character is somehow light and insubstantial: you can see there are motivations, crisis states, visceral reactions, but you cannot really approach those, scrutinize them or truly see what is going on in Polina's head, which makes her look a bit impersonal.

The narrative imposes a distance between the reader and the dancing girl on the book's stage, as if you were watching her through opera binoculars. The only hint you get that this is not the case is one moment you get two different renditions of the dance teacher, one from an outside point of view, one from supposedly her point of view. This is a wonderful achievement of writing and drawing blending together to serve a point, but the point they serve is pretty unclear.

[Guilherme Smee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Olha, eu costumo curtir muito os quadrinhos de Bastien Vivés, mas este Polina não me arrebatou de frente como as outras obras dele que li, como O Gosto do Cloro e Uma Irmã, que me deixaram bastante impactados. Ler Polina, com um estilo de desenho diferente do que Vivés utilizou nos outros álbuns, não é como ler uma história, mas como contemplar uma vida. Talvez por não usar esse recurso narrativo de ter uma história com reviravoltas radicais, mas leves ao sabor da vida, como Sofia Copolla faz no filme Encontros e Desencontros, me decepcionou. Mas vejam bem, isso não significa que esse seja um quadrinho ruim, mas que frustrou minhas expectativas a partir do conjunto da obra do autor, que vinha provocando outras sensações em mim. Na verdade é uma crítica bem em cima do muro da minha parte, porque olhando em retrocesso, o fluxo da história é bastante inovador, diferente do ritmo que as histórias em quadrinhos, em sua maioria costuma empregar. Mas mesmo assim, a história de Polina não me cativou. Se você quiser ver uma história de ballet que traga muitas reviravoltas recomendo a série da Netflix Pretty Little Things.

[leamcarre · Rating 5 out of 5]

Un roman graphique assez perturbant (surtout au début), tant par ses illustrations que par l’univers de la danse qu’il met en avant. Les illustrations à l’encre, minimalistes, grises et sèches, servent complètement l’histoire et participent grandement à rendre l’atmosphère étouffante.
Je suis d’ailleurs intimement persuadée que, si le graphisme avait été différent, l’histoire aurait perdu de son intensité pour devenir trop simple, trop banale.
C’est peut-être même la première fois que je vois un roman graphique où les illustrations servent à ce point l’histoire, avec un véritable sens derrière les apparences. Le tout est pour moi très réfléchi et d’une grande technique.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Simple, unassuming, straightforward story of a Russian girl learning to be a ballerina from a very young age and her relationship with her mentor. Vives has an amazing skill with gesture; to the untrained eye it might look sloppy or messy, but it's remarkably accurate. It's a long book and there's nothing too flashy or surprising about it, but it's a great change of pace for me. There is a great bit of writing and art late in the book that I won't spoil, but Vives again knows how to make the best use of his style.

[Julie lit pour les autres · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un beau récit, très léger en texte, mais qui s'exprime surtout dans les lignes du dessin de Vivès. Parfois grasses, épaisses, quasiment lourdes; parfois, sinueuses, légères, minimalistes, les lignes me semblent le reflet du chemin complexe de Polina et la relation tendue qu'elle entretient avec le professeur. On pourrait reprocher le manque de contenu ou d'intrigue. Or, il me semble que ce serait ne pas tenir compte du caractère quasi impressionniste de ce récit, où le lecteur est toujours à quelques pas de Polina et retient son souffle lorsqu'elle s'approche de la scène pour danser.

[Xt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Histoire intéressante mais qui peine à être captivante dû à un manque de profondeur et trop d’ellipses de narration. Beaucoup d’explications sans montrer concrètement les choses. Même si je suis sensible aux traits à la plume et l’encre, les séquences de dessin ne m’ont pas transcendé, ça ressemblait plus à des sketch sur le vif. La scène de dernière rencontre avec le professeur m’a bien plus marqué. Les moments subtils sont assez réussis, mais ne permettent pas de mettre de côté un sentiment de malaise assez important.

[littleprettybooks · Rating 4 out of 5]

16/20

Des dessins en noir et blanc qui jouent sur les nuances et les ombres. Une précision à couper le souffle et une représentation du ballet et de l’exigence de la discipline assez impressionnantes. Une BD qui se lit avec attention et concentration, qui s’admire aussi bien souvent. Même si Polina est peut-être un peu difficile à connaître entièrement, on la suit avec beaucoup d’intérêt.

Ma chronique : https://myprettybooks.wordpress.com/2...

[Maggie Gordon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful exploration of a woman's creative journey and her relationship with an influential mentor.

[Urbon Adamsson · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first half of the story is very incipient. After 100 pages of reading I felt not much had happened, but in reality I was spectating memories being built.

The second half is where this story really shines.

A mix of twists of fate and courage puts Polina in route to her dreams.

Her troublesome relationship with her professor finds an interesting conclusion in the last pages.

It might take a lifetime, but in the end our good deeds have the potential to grow into something magical.

The road to hell might be full of good intentions of those that failed but every good deed has to start with a good intention.

A story that I enjoyed much more than I expected.

[Przemysław Skoczyński · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ta historia niesie swój chłód i ciężar, co może wielu odrzucić, ale moim zdaniem kapitalnie koresponduje to z niewesołym czasem, jakim jest nauka w rosyjskich szkołach baletowych. To ten smutek i stan ducha, który sprawia, że właśnie Rosjanie są tak dobrzy w balecie czy tańcu na lodzie. Warstwa graficzna powala. Vives kładzie nacisk na cieniowanie, operuje trzema kolorami, z czego największe wrażenie robią plamy czerni (spróbujcie czasem zmróżyc oczy czytając). Autor gra też zwiewną kreską, dobrze oddającą dynamikę i piękno tańca. Bardzo "poetyckie" i do wielokrotnej lektury.

[Elene Figuer · Rating 3 out of 5]

No me ha maravillado, la verdad.

Muchos estereotipos que ya conocemos todos y un camino lleno de triunfos muy lejanos a la realidad. Polina estaba llamada a triunfar desde la página 1.

Si la vida fuera tan sencilla como que la suerte te esté esperando tomando una copa en un bar... Lo más cercano a la realidad es que en ese bar te espere una vida de bailarina de barra en la miseria, pero Polina estaba llamada a triunfar, desde la página 1.

Y hablando del dibujo, tosco y con frecuencia descuidado, con breves pausas de lucidez.