Remarks by
The Honourable Anita Neville, P.C., O.M.
Lieutenant Governor of Manitoba
ROYAL WINNIPEG BALLET SCHOOL SCHOLARSHIP PRESENTATION
Royal Winnipeg Ballet-380 Graham Avenue
Friday, November 10, 2023, 7:00pm
(please check against delivery)
Students of dance and members of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet family, welcome to this celebration of blooming talents and sore toes.
As Lieutenant Governor of Manitoba, it is my pleasure to join you this evening here in the heart of Treaty One land and the heartland of the Red River Metis.
This beautiful and diverse province is also the ancestral and the present-day home of the Anishinaabe, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota, Dene, Inuit and Metis peoples.
Together, we must continue to work to hear truths, and to advance understanding, opportunity, and healing for all.
Manitobans are proud of the rich artistic diversity of our province – including the artistic contributions of large and vibrant Indigenous communities. Music and dance of all kinds bring us together and help us to better listen and learn and work for a better common future.
It’s my pleasure, as Lieutenant Governor, to meet talented and hard-working young people at schools and colleges across our province. As somebody who previously had a close involvement in the K to 12 and career education fields, I always find it inspiring to see the flowering of young talent and the products of hard work.
And so tonight, I’m looking forward to seeing the Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s scholarship recipients in action.
I know that, as students at Canada’s most esteemed ballet school, tonight’s honorees have been working for years to master the complex vocabulary of the language of ballet.
They’ve been working on their pliés (plee-aye), jetés (je-tay), arabesques (ara-besk) and everything else.
More importantly, they’ve been learning to express powerful ideas and emotions through movement, to create moments of beauty that cannot easily be put into words.
As Martha Graham once said, “Your body says what words cannot.”
I’ll have to rely on words. So to all of the students whose hard work is being recognized tonight: congratulations. May you continue to find expression and joy in dance.
And to all of you who have supported these scholarships and the Royal Winnipeg Ballet, thank you for supporting the arts, for enabling the creation of beauty. And thank you to all of those who have made this special celebration possible.
Thank you. Merci. Meegwich.
