The Waltz of the Snowflakes from Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker.

Program design by Leon Bakst for Nijinsky's L'Apre-Midi d'une Faune, Paris 1912, Diaghilev's Ballets Russes.

Costume design by Bakst for the ballerina Ida Rubinstein as Helene de Sparta, 1912.

Darcy Bussell and Carlos Acosta taking a curtain call.

Ballet is a type of dance. It is only done by dancers who have had special training. The dancers are employed by a dance company, and they perform in theatres. The first reference to ballet is found in a work of Domenico da Piacenza, who lived in the early 14th century.