Ballet: The ballet school of the Mariinsky Theatre spawned the careers of artists Mathilde Kschessinskaya, Olga Preobrajenskaya, Anna Pavlova, Tamara Karsavina, Vaslav Nijinsky, and George Balanchine, students of the Imperial Ballet School and style, and, under and after the teachings of Agrippina Vaganova, artists Marina Semyonova, Galina Ulanova, Rudolf Nureyev, Natalia Makarova, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Irina Kolpakova, Galina Mezentseva, Altynai Asylmuratova, as well as more recent dancers of renown Ulyana Lopatkina, Diana Vishneva, and Svetlana Zakharova, students of the school as now named, the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet.