Alberta Ballet School graduate accepted into Argentina's premier dance company after first pro audition
Yoshino Horita didn't hesitate when her new boss asked her what her goals were at Teatro Colon's Ballet Company in Buenos Aires.
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This is no ordinary boss. Julio Bocca is the newly installed director of Argentina's 100-year-old national ballet company and a global superstar in the world of dance. The New York Times describes him as 'the most famous Argentine dancer in recent memory.' At his peak, his performances would fill soccer stadiums in his home country.
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Still, Horita didn't mince words.
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In February, Horita was one of hundreds of young dancers who auditioned in front of Bocca, who took over as director of the company in 2024. When he accepted the role, he told the New York Times he wanted the company to 'find its place among the best in the world' and audiences at the historic Teatro Colon would see 'the best of the best' whenever the curtains rose.
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Auditions for major ballet companies can be ruthless. They take the form of a class, and dancers can be cut within five minutes. Even for those who pass the audition, the usual practice is to offer a contract for the future, maybe six months or a year down the road. Students like Horita tend to blast audition tapes out to as many companies as they can, but have low expectations of being successful right off the bat.
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But after her February audition in Buenos Aires, Horita was accepted on the spot. To say this is unusual in the world of ballet is an understatement. What makes it even more remarkable is that it was her very first professional audition. She hadn't even graduated from Calgary's Alberta Ballet School yet.
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'I couldn't believe it for 10 minutes or so, actually,' she says. 'I called my mom and I told her I was accepted. Then we both started panicking. But after a bit, I came down mentally and was very grateful and happy.'
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After four months in Buenos Aires working full time with the company, Horita was back in Calgary this week. The 18-year-old has to write her final exams at the Alberta Ballet School, which offers a full academic and residential program for aspiring dancers from around the globe. On Sunday, she will graduate and say goodbye to the school and city that have been her home since arriving at the age of 15 from Kumamoto, Japan.
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Calgary Herald
4 days ago
- Calgary Herald
Alberta Ballet School graduate accepted into Argentina's premier dance company after first pro audition
Yoshino Horita didn't hesitate when her new boss asked her what her goals were at Teatro Colon's Ballet Company in Buenos Aires. Article content This is no ordinary boss. Julio Bocca is the newly installed director of Argentina's 100-year-old national ballet company and a global superstar in the world of dance. The New York Times describes him as 'the most famous Argentine dancer in recent memory.' At his peak, his performances would fill soccer stadiums in his home country. Article content Article content Still, Horita didn't mince words. Article content Article content In February, Horita was one of hundreds of young dancers who auditioned in front of Bocca, who took over as director of the company in 2024. When he accepted the role, he told the New York Times he wanted the company to 'find its place among the best in the world' and audiences at the historic Teatro Colon would see 'the best of the best' whenever the curtains rose. Article content Auditions for major ballet companies can be ruthless. They take the form of a class, and dancers can be cut within five minutes. Even for those who pass the audition, the usual practice is to offer a contract for the future, maybe six months or a year down the road. Students like Horita tend to blast audition tapes out to as many companies as they can, but have low expectations of being successful right off the bat. Article content Article content But after her February audition in Buenos Aires, Horita was accepted on the spot. To say this is unusual in the world of ballet is an understatement. What makes it even more remarkable is that it was her very first professional audition. She hadn't even graduated from Calgary's Alberta Ballet School yet. Article content 'I couldn't believe it for 10 minutes or so, actually,' she says. 'I called my mom and I told her I was accepted. Then we both started panicking. But after a bit, I came down mentally and was very grateful and happy.' Article content After four months in Buenos Aires working full time with the company, Horita was back in Calgary this week. The 18-year-old has to write her final exams at the Alberta Ballet School, which offers a full academic and residential program for aspiring dancers from around the globe. On Sunday, she will graduate and say goodbye to the school and city that have been her home since arriving at the age of 15 from Kumamoto, Japan.
Winnipeg Free Press
25-05-2025
- Winnipeg Free Press
In Netflix's ‘The Eternaut,' an Argentine comic goes global as dystopia hits home
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — A group of friends gather to play cards in their host's cozy home when the power cuts. Cellphones die. An eerie snow falls all over the city, killing everyone it touches. The friends struggle to survive, their panic replaced by a growing awareness that humanity itself is at stake. This is the premise of 'The Eternaut,' a chilling dystopian drama out of Argentina that premiered its first season on Netflix on April 30. The six-episode, Spanish-language series with its mix of sci-fi elements and focus on humanity's resilience, has struck a universal nerve, rocketing to No. 1 among Netflix's most streamed non-English-language TV shows within days. Netflix already renewed the show for a second season, with filming scheduled to start next year. But 'The Eternaut' has touched on something deeper in Argentina, where legendary comic-strip writer Héctor Germán Oesterheld penned the original graphic novel in 1957 — two decades before he was 'disappeared' by Argentina's military dictatorship, along with all four of his daughters. Abroad, publishers are scrambling to keep pace with renewed interest in the source material. The Seattle-based Fantagraphics Books said it would reissue an out-of-print English translation due to the surge in U.S. demand. At home, the TV adaptation has reopened historical wounds and found unexpected resonance at a moment of heightened anxiety about the state of Argentine society under far-right President Javier Milei. 'The boom of 'The Eternaut' has created a cultural and social event beyond the series,' said Martín Oesterheld, the writer's grandson and a creative consultant and executive producer on the show. 'It fills our hearts. It brings us pride.' An alien invasion hits home For years, the surviving Oesterhelds resisted offers from Hollywood to adapt the cult classic, wary of the industry's seemingly irresistible urge to destroy New York City and other Western centers in apocalyptic dramas. To honor his grandfather's creation, Martín Oesterheld said the show had to be filmed in Spanish, with an Argentine cast and set in Buenos Aires. 'What he did was to do away with the representations of science fiction that we know in Europe and the United States,' Martín Oesterheld said of his grandfather. 'He told it on our own terms, through things that we recognize.' Netflix, pushing to expand beyond its saturated U.S. market into previously untapped regions like Latin America, was a natural fit, he said. The streaming giant wouldn't disclose its budget, but said the special effect-laden show took four years of pre- and post-production, involved 2,900 people and pumped $34 million into Argentina's economy. In the show, aliens wreak predictable mayhem on an unpredictable cityscape — wide boulevards, neoclassical buildings, antique pizza halls and grimy suburbs — lending the show a shiver of curious power for Argentines who had never seen their city eviscerated on screen. The protagonists don't play poker but truco, a popular Argentine trick card game. They sip from gourds of mate, the signature Argentine drink made from yerba leaves. The snowfall is uncanny, and not just because it kills on contact. Buenos Aires has only seen snow twice in the last century. 'From truco in scene one, which couldn't be more Argentine, we see that 'The Eternaut' is playing with these contrasts — life and death, light and darkness, the familiar versus the alien,' said Martín Hadis, an Argentine researcher specializing in science fiction. 'It's not just a sci-fi story. It's a modern myth. That's what makes it so universal.' In updating the story to present-day Argentina, the show brings the nation's disastrous 1982 war with Britain over Las Malvinas, or the Falkland Islands, into the backstory of its hero, Juan Salvo, played by renowned actor Ricardo Darín. Salvo, a protective father and courageous ex-soldier who emerges to lead the group of survivors, is haunted by the rout of his comrades sent by Argentina's dictatorship to retake the South Atlantic islands. The defeat killed 649 Argentine soldiers, many of them untrained conscripts. 'The conflict in Las Malvinas is not closed, it's still a bloody wound,' Darín told The Associated Press. 'It's bringing the subject back to the table. That has moved a lot of people.' Argentine underdogs Faced with catastrophe, the protagonists rely on their own ingenuity, and on each other, to survive. What comes through, the creators say, is the Argentine saying 'atado con alambre' — roughly, 'held together with wire' — used to describe the inventive nature of those who do much with little in a nation that has suffered through decades of military rule and economic crises. 'It says a lot about being Argentine — taking whatever you have at your disposal and pushing your limitations,' said Martín Oesterheld. He was referring not only to the plot but also to the production at a time when Milei has waged war on Argentina's bloated state and slashed funding to cultural programs like the National Film Institute. 'As our culture is being defunded, we're taking this Argentine product to the world,' Martín Oesterheld said. Against this backdrop, the show's message of solidarity has gained an urgent new meaning, with Argentines outraged over Milei's libertarian ideology transforming the series' motto, 'No one gets through it alone,' into a rallying cry. The slogan was scrawled on signs at protests by retirees demonstrating against the government's sharp cuts to their pensions this month. To protect against police tear gas, some traded bandannas for the gas masks used in the show to shield against toxic snowfall. 'There is a general policy these days that the state shouldn't take care of its citizens, which relates to individual freedom,' Darín said. But there are many cases where if the state disappears completely, people are left to drift, as if they were shipwrecked.' A search reignited As the Netflix series exploded out of the gate, missing-persons flyers for Héctor Oesterheld, his daughters and potential grandchildren popped up on billboards for 'The Eternaut' all over Buenos Aires, a reminder of the real-life horror story behind the pulp adventure. By the time the military junta came to power in 1976, Oesterheld, 58, had become known as a committed leftist, his four daughters, ranging in age from 19 to 25, had joined a far-left guerilla group and the whole family had turned into a target of Latin America's deadliest dictatorship. Two of Oesterheld's daughters were pregnant at the time of their kidnapping. To this day, no one knows what happened to their unborn children, but they are believed to be among the estimated 500 newborns snatched from their parents and handed over to childless military officers, their true identities erased. The three surviving members of the Oesterheld family have never stopped searching. Martín Oesterheld's grandmother, Elsa, who raised him after his mother was killed, banded together with other women dedicated to finding their missing grandchildren. They became known as the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo. Seizing on national interest in the TV series, the Grandmothers this month issued public appeals for help finding the disappeared grandchildren. The response was overwhelming. 'It was incredible, it went viral,' said Esteban Herrera, who works with the Grandmothers and is still searching for his own missing sibling. 'Since it's a science-fiction series on a platform like Netflix, we're reaching homes that the Grandmothers perhaps hadn't before.' The outpouring of emails and calls raised more questions than answers. Reaching out were hundreds of Argentine viewers newly determined to find their own disappeared relatives or suddenly skeptical about the legality of their own adoptions. 'The Eternaut' is a living memory, a classic story that's passed down from generation to generation,' said Martín Oesterheld. 'For it to be embraced by so many people in this way … there is no greater social commentary.' ___ Follow AP's coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at
Winnipeg Free Press
23-05-2025
- Winnipeg Free Press
As more Argentines go childless, pampered dogs become part of the family
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Venus gazes in bewilderment at the candles flickering on her mini birthday cake. The partygoers crowd around her in expectant silence, but she doesn't blow them out. Dogs can't blow candles, after all. So Venus' owner intervened, drawing a breath and extinguishing the flames to a round of applause before serving her black mixed-breed a bite of meat-flavored birthday cake. 'Venus is like my daughter,' gushes Victoria Font, founder of Barto Cafe, a bakery making cakes for canines just south of Argentina's capital of Buenos Aires. About two decades ago, a birthday party for pampered pets featuring a custom cake for dogs may have struck Argentines as bizarre. But these days Buenos Aires makes headlines for having among the most pet owners per capita in the world. Public opinion surveys report pets in almost 80% of the city's homes. That's about 20% more than the average city in the United States, according to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center, and leaps and bounds ahead of other countries in the region. As a growing number of Argentines opt to be childless in a country notorious for its economic instability, dogs have become the go-to companion. Buenos Aires is now home to over 493,600 dogs — compared to 460,600 children under the age of 14 — government statistics show. Those interviewed referred to themselves not as 'owners' but as 'parents.' 'Sandro is my savior, he's my joy,' Magalí Maisonnave, a 34-year-old stylist, said of her dachshund. In the soccer-crazed country, Maisonnave often dresses Sandro up in the jersey of her favorite team, River Plate, and takes him to local games. 'I'm his mama,' she said. 'You have to give them the best' Argentina's rising passion for dogs has coincided with falling human fertility. In 2023, Argentina's birth rate was 6.5% lower than the previous year and 41% lower than it was a decade ago. Kindergartens report struggling to fill classrooms. No longer able to afford bigger purchases amid a succession of economic crises, Argentina's middle and upper classes are splurging on their pets. With unemployment rising, public sector wages falling and the economy just emerging from a recession under Argentina's libertarian President Javier Milei, pups have become precious relatives. 'It's harder to access loans or own a home; there's no longer a set way to form a family,' said Dr. Marcos Díaz Videla, a psychologist specialized in human-canine relationships. 'Animals are becoming part of the family. With humans, they're shaping the dynamics, rituals and routines inside the home.' The tendency for pet owners to treat their dogs like kids is changing the cityscape as pet hotels, boutiques, cafes and even cemeteries spring up in Buenos Aires to cash in on the craze. Pet beauty salons now pull out all the stops, providing not only baths and trims but pedicures and poolside spas. The Guau Experience parlor, for instance, charges up to $120 — roughly a quarter of the average Argentine monthly salary — for washing, cleaning, shining, conditioning, trimming and perfuming. 'They're living beings who don't stay around long. During that time, you have to give them the best,' said Nicole Verdier, owner of Argentina's first-ever dog bakery, Chumbis, which makes cookies, cakes, croissants, burgers and canapés from gourmet meat, chicken and pork. This humanizing of dogs has even inspired a new noun — 'perrhijo' — a fusion of the Spanish word for 'dog' and 'child.' Dog mania takes Buenos Aires In Buenos Aires, where leash-pullers outnumber stroller-pushers in many neighborhoods, lawmakers have proposed a range of pet-friendly initiatives, including bills to ease access for pets to public transport. 'The city has come a long way, but I believe it now has the obligation to take a bigger leap,' said local lawmaker Emmanuel Ferrario. His centrist 'Vamos por más' (Let's go for more) party has presented five such bills now being debated in the city legislature. One seeks to create a registry of dog walkers who must pass an exam every two years and undergo CPR and animal behavior training. 'I see an opportunity for it to become the most pet-friendly city in the region,' Ferrario said. Other politicians fret about the proliferation of pet-keeping as a symptom of a bigger crisis. They ask why young people in Argentina choose raising pets over raising children as the country ages rapidly. 'The rankings (of pet ownership) are unsettling. … Buenos Aires has so many dogs and so few children,' said Clara Muzzio, the city's conservative deputy mayor. 'A world with fewer children is a worse world.' A presidential pet lover Perhaps Argentina's most prominent dog fanatic is its right-wing President Javier Milei, who moved into the government house in December 2023 with four English mastiffs that he calls his 'four-legged children.' A brash TV personality elected to rescue Argentina from its spiraling economic crisis, Milei named Murray, Milton, Robert and Lucas after the three libertarian American economists he most admires — Murray Rothbard, Milton Friedman and Robert Lucas. The dogs are genetic clones of Milei's former dog, Conan, who died in 2017. Milei still refers to Conan in the present tense, leading to intense speculation about the number of dogs he owns. Since assuming office, his dogs have remained out of sight. A government resolution prohibiting officials from disclosing information to the public about Milei's mastiffs has done little to tamp down on the controversy. Pet cemeteries For heartbroken owners without the financial means to genetically duplicate their dead dogs, Argentine morticians prepare burials and cremations. Wednesdays A weekly look towards a post-pandemic future. Demand has surged at Gardens of the Soul, a pet cemetery inside an animal shelter near Buenos Aires, where owners hold emotional rituals to bid their companions farewell and regularly visit their graves. There are some 300 tombstones painted with classic Argentine canine names, like Negro and Coco, and strewn with photographs, handwritten notes and flowers. 'Before, two months could go by without anyone being buried. Now, it's at least once or twice a week,' said shelter manager Alicia Barreto, who still mourns her first rescue, a pup she found alive in a bag of dog carcasses thrown on the roadside in 2000. That grisly image haunts her, she said. But she takes comfort in knowing that, when the time came 10 years later, she gave her 'perrhijo,' Mariano, a dignified burial. 'I told myself I would find him again,' she said at his marble tombstone. 'At the moment of my death, or afterward, I'll be reunited with him.'
