The dance is a spirit. It turns the body to liquid steel. It makes it vibrate like a guitar. The body can fly without wings. It can sing without voice. The dance is strong magic. The dance is life.
—Pearl Primus
Pearl Primus
Rock Daniel (1944)
Photograph © Barbara Morgan, the Barbara Morgan Archive
Dance and anthropology claimed each other as partners through the focused work of artist-scholars Katherine Dunham and Dr. Pearl Primus (nine years younger). Beginning in the 1920s and 1930s, both in their distinct ways invested in researching and embodying traditional roots of the African and Caribbean lineage of American dance. Their work inspired the Pan-African movement in the Caribbean and challenged social norms in the United States. Other dynamic artists were also engaging cross-cultural and political issues. Leftist dance, the emergence of black urban dance, and the formation of the New Dance Group all had impact.6 Helen Tamiris, focusing on social concerns, took her creative work to Broadway, with Daniel Nagrin as featured performer. First in New York City and then in Los Angeles, Japanese-born Michio Ito created a unique East-West synthesis, influencing numerous artists, including Denishawn, before being deported to Japan during World War II (1941) and establishing his school in Tokyo.
Alvin Ailey and Carmen De Lavallade
Dedication to José Clemente Orozco
John Lindquist photograph (MS Thr 482) © Harvard Theatre Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard University
Don’t try to dance like him or her. Dance like yourself.
—Lester Horton
In the 1940s through 1950s on the West Coast, Lester Horton collaborated with dancer Bella Lewitsky to develop a unique technique and performance group; establish one of the first permanent theaters in America devoted to dance, Dance Theater in Hollywood (1946); and organize one of the first integrated modern dance companies, including performers Carmen De Lavallade and Alvin Ailey. After Horton’s death in 1953, his legacy was continued by young Alvin Ailey, who moved east in 1958 and created his own theatrically imaginative company. Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s mission includes “preserving the uniqueness of the African American cultural experience.” Featured dancer Judith Jamison became its next director, followed by Robert Battle in 2011.
The third generation of dance artists who formed companies in the 1950s also includes Erick Hawkins, Paul Taylor, and Merce Cunningham. Each danced with Martha Graham, yet each moved away from the dramatic narrative that characterized her work. The Erick Hawkins Dance Company, and Hawkins’s “free flow” technique, developed fluid, seemingly effortless dancing and influenced the emerging field of somatic practices. On the West Coast, pioneering dance artist Anna Halprin founded the influential Dancers Workshop in 1955, spearheading the expressive arts healing movement and engaging social issues.
Rather than practice [dancing], like the piano, I preferred the idea of adventure. Instead of saying no, you find out if you can say yes, you find out something more … We’re capable of many more physical things than we think. First of all it’s a question of changing your mind.
—Merce Cunningham
Merce Cunningham, founding his company in 1953, partnered with musician John Cage to engage “the power of the instant” and open uncharted territories. Graham’s emphasis was on psychological, dramatic themes. Cunningham wanted something without that weight; the drama was in the steps.7 Explorations included chance works reflecting Zen principles, and innovative (early and ongoing) interactions with technology. From Black Mountain College residencies with Cage and visual artists, Cunningham developed an entourage of collaborators including David Tudor, Robert Rauschenberg, and Jackson Pollock. The dance was independent onstage—holding its own in time and space as other elements moved, vibrated, and illuminated the space (like the giant Mylar pillows created by Andy Warhol for Rainforest with electronic score by Cage). Sometimes the music and costumes would be added the night of performance to ensure no premeditated connection.
Erick Hawkins
El Penitente (1940)
Photograph © Barbara Morgan, the Barbara Morgan Archive
Musician John Cage said that what he and Merce Cunningham were aiming for in their dances was “the imitation of nature in its manner of her operation.” In a meadow, a bird flies one direction, a rabbit runs another. 8
The Cunningham dance technique, central to the training of many dancers—even in the rebellious 1960s—requires a strong central axis with the capability and responsiveness to move from any point in the body, to any place in space, at any time. With a strong background in tap and ballroom, Cunningham engaged fast, rhythmically complex footwork, developing a technique that was comparable to ballet in its formality. With Cunningham, a new era was always beginning. Challenging for audiences, his “abstract” work required total absorption in the moment at hand; attention to larger systems and processes than the personal; and sometimes, the capacity to endure—sound, light, and abstract movement—with curiosity and a sense of humor. In 2009, Cunningham made his last work; it premiered on his ninetieth birthday.
Merce Cunningham
Totem Ancestor (1942)
Photograph © Barbara Morgan, the Barbara Morgan Archive
Basic dance—and I should qualify the word basic—is primarily concerned with motion. So immediately you will say, but the basketball player is concerned with motion. That is so—but he is not concerned with it primarily. His action is a means towards an end beyond motion. In basic dance the motion is its own end—that is, it is concerned with nothing beyond itself.
—Alwin Nikolais
Often called the father of multimedia theater, Alwin Nikolais was not only the choreographer, but the composer as well as the lighting and costume designer for all of his works. Nikolais studied with all the pioneers, working primarily with Hanya Holm. The Nikolais Dance Theater and school, founded in 1951 at the Henry Street Playhouse in New York City, incorporated daily improvisation and choreography and influenced generations of emerging artists throughout the world. In an age when Freudian imagery was dominant, Nikolais defined dance as the “art of motion,” and believed in the power and mystique inherent in abstraction, where motion, light, and sound were equal partners. Distinctive Nikolais works include Masks, Props, and Mobiles (1953); Totem (1960); and Count Down (1979).9
Merce talked about surprising oneself, about taking unexpected turns towards what you may not recognize. Murray always talked about energy, time, and space, about dancing like a spice jar (in the best of ways). Both images suggest envisioning consequence in a way. Marshal the body, sense the effect. Delicious. Fun. Hard.
—Bebe Miller
Collaborator Murray Louis performed with Nikolais and also formed his own company (Murray Louis Dance Company, 1953). His focused attention on physicality underlies the Nikolais-Louis technique. Other companies spawned from the Nikolais Dance Theater include the Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company (Salt Lake City) and PearsonWidrig DanceTheater (New York City), among others. The often-cited characteristics of “wonder, delight, and mystery” were carried on by Pilobolus, founded by students at Dartmouth College with their teacher Alison Chase (1971) from her class on collaboration and improvisation, followed by the offshoot company Momix. Bebe Miller spent Saturday