Charles Le Picq


Charles Felix Richard Auguste Le Picq was an influential French dancer and choreographer. One of the most outstanding dancers of the eighteenth century.
Le Picq was the grandson of the renowned French dance teacher Antoine Le Picq, and the son of a dancer and dance teacher Jean Felix Charles Le Picq and his wife Marie Magdaleine Kugler.
Initially, he learned to dance in Paris with Jean-Baptiste-François Dehesse / Deshayes. Later he was in Stuttgart a pupil of Jean Georges Noverre, one of the creators of modern ballet. In the years 1765-1777 his stage partner was a well-known Italian dancer Anna Binetti. He was called the "Apollo of the Dance" and performed in many countries, such as Württemberg, Austria, Poland, Italy, France, Spain, England and Russia. In the Mozart aria Rivolgete a lui lo sguardo, Guglielmo boasts that he and Ferrando dance so elegantly "that Le Picq would bow before us".
In 1786 Charles Le Pic was invited to Russia, to St. Petersburg to head the Imperial ballet. He arrived in St. Petersburg with his wife, who also got an invitation to work in the Imperial ballet, and his stepson. The family remained forever in Russia. He was a huge influence on the development of Russian ballet. Thanks to him, the Noverre' book Letters on the dance was published in Russia in 1803. He advised in 1801 to invite to Russia the French choreographer Charles Didelot.
His wife and stage partner was Bavarian ballerina Gertrude Ablöscher-Rossi. His stepson was Carlo Rossi, became the famous Russian architect, son of son of Gertrude's first husband, Italian dancer and choreographer Domenico Rossi. The children of Charles Le Picq and Gertrude were: Caroline, Henriette Wilhelmine and Marie Gertrude, they also had a son Charles. They were short dancers in Russia at the end of the 18th century.