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71-531: As a choreographer, teacher, and leader of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, Cunningham had a profound influence on modern dance . Many dancers who trained with Cunningham formed their own companies. They include Paul Taylor , Remy Charlip , Viola Farber , Charles Moulton , Karole Armitage , Deborah Hay , Robert Kovich, Foofwa d'Imobilité , Kimberly Bartosik, Flo Ankah , Jan Van Dyke , Jonah Bokaer , and Alice Reyes . In 2009,

142-434: A characteristic trait, and Butoh , Japanese contemporary dancing that developed in the 1950s. It incorporates modern European influences, via the work of pioneers like Isadora Duncan. According to Treva Bedinghaus, "Modern dancers use dancing to express their innermost emotions, often to get closer to their inner-selves. Before attempting to choreograph a routine, the modern dancer decides which emotions to try to convey to

213-544: A gate house, dining hall, sleeping lodges, several cottages and other structures. In May 1941, following the end of their lease at Blue Ridge Assembly, the College moved its operations to Lake Eden, where it remained until its closing in 1957. Over these 16 years, College faculty, staff, and students established a working farm and constructed new buildings, including the iconic Studies Building designed by architect A. Lawrence Kocher , music rehearsal cubicles (Paul Beidler),

284-573: A heightened sense of awareness of being grounded to the floor while, at the same time, feeling the energy throughout your entire body, extending it to the audience. Her principal contributions to dance are the focus of the 'center' of the body (as contrast to ballet's emphasis on limbs), coordination between breathing and movement , and a dancer's relationship with the floor. In 1927, newspapers regularly began assigning dance critics, such as Walter Terry, and Edwin Denby , who approached performances from

355-401: A particular sound—what did the I Ching suggest? Well, I took this also for dance . I was working on a title called, "Untitled Solo", and I had made—using the chance operations—a series of movements written on scraps of paper for the legs and the arms, the head, all different. And it was done not to the music but with the music of Christian Wolff . Cunningham valued the process of a work over

426-428: A pile of second-hand clothes picked out by the designer, Robert Rauschenberg . Rauschenberg was also responsible for creating a new set for every show with items he found in the theatre. Suite by Chance (1953) was his first work made entirely through chance procedures. Charts were created listing elements such as space, time, and positions. A coin was then tossed to determine each of these elements. Canfield (1969)

497-485: A seminal academic freedom incident, specifically for refusing to sign a loyalty pledge, for which Rollins was formally censured by the American Association of University Professors . The institution was established to "avoid the pitfalls of autocratic chancellors and trustees and allow for a more flexible curriculum," and "with the holistic aim 'to educate a student as a person and a citizen.'" The school

568-739: A soloist in the Martha Graham Dance Company for six years. He presented his first solo concert in New York in April 1944 with composer John Cage , who became his lifelong romantic partner and frequent collaborator until Cage's death in 1992. In the summer of 1953, as a teacher in residence at Black Mountain College , Cunningham formed the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Throughout his career, Cunningham choreographed more than 200 dances and over 800 Events , or site-specific choreographic works. In 1963 he joined with Cage to create

639-431: A three-screen animation that was commissioned by and premiered at SIGGRAPH in 1998. This led to a live dance for the stage, BIPED , for which Kaiser and Eshkar provided the projected decor. In 2008, Cunningham released his Loops choreography for the hands as motion-capture data under a Creative Commons license; this was the basis for the open-source collaboration of the same name with The OpenEnded Group . Cunningham

710-465: Is Revelations (1960). The legacy of modern dance can be seen in lineage of 20th-century concert dance forms. Although often producing divergent dance forms, many seminal dance artists share a common heritage that can be traced back to free dance. Postmodern dance developed in the 1960s in United States when society questioned truths and ideologies in politics and art . This period

781-417: Is now called improvisational or free dance . These dancers disregarded ballet's strict movement vocabulary (the particular, limited set of movements that were considered proper to ballet) and stopped wearing corsets and pointe shoes in the search for greater freedom of movement. Throughout the 20th century, sociopolitical concerns, major historical events, and the development of other art forms contributed to

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852-606: The Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, headed by Nellie Cornish , from 1937 to 1939 to study acting, but found drama's reliance on text and miming too limiting and concrete. Cunningham preferred the ambiguous nature of dance, which gave him an outlet for exploration of movement. During this time, Martha Graham saw Cunningham dance and invited him to join her company. In 1939, Cunningham moved to New York City and danced as

923-560: The Jim Crow era. Notable African-American instructors included Carol Brice and Roland Hayes during the 1945 Summer Music Institute; Percy H. Baker, hired on full-time in 1945; Jacob Lawrence and Gwendolyn Knight during the 1946 Summer Art Institute; and Mark Oakland Fax for the Spring 1946 quarter. The Julius Rosenwald Fund provided African-American teachers' salaries as well as student scholarships. The college originally rented

994-593: The Late Modern period ( c. 1946–1957), José Limón , Pearl Primus , Merce Cunningham , Talley Beatty , Erick Hawkins , Anna Sokolow , Anna Halprin , and Paul Taylor introduced clear abstractionism and avant-garde movements, and paved the way for postmodern dance . Modern dance has evolved with each subsequent generation of participating artists. Artistic content has morphed and shifted from one choreographer to another, as have styles and techniques. Artists such as Graham and Horton developed techniques in

1065-766: The Pearl Primus Dance Language Institute . Alvin Ailey studied under Lester Horton , Bella Lewitzky , and later Martha Graham. He spent several years working in both concert and theater dance. In 1958, Ailey and a group of young African-American dancers performed as the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in New York . He drew upon his "blood memories" of Texas , the blues, spirituals and gospel as inspiration. His most popular and critically acclaimed work

1136-786: The Walker Art Center 's first performance, instigating what would be a 25-year collaborative relationship with the Walker. In his performances, he often used the I Ching to determine the sequence of his dances and, often, dancers were not informed of the order until the night of the performance. In addition to his role as choreographer, Cunningham performed as a dancer in his company into the early 1990s. In 1968 Cunningham published his book Changes: Notes on Choreography , edited by Francis Starr, containing various sketches of his choreography. A mural, located in Washington Hall on

1207-630: The YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly buildings south of Black Mountain, North Carolina, founded and owned by another progressive educator, Willis D. Weatherford . In 1937, it purchased a 667-acre (270 ha) property across the valley at Lake Eden. This property, developed by E.W. Grove (of the Grove Park Inn and Grove Arcade in Asheville) as a summer resort for residents of his nearby Grovemont neighborhood, included

1278-417: The 1930s and 1940s the school flourished, becoming well known as an incubator for artistic talent. Notable events at the school were common; it was here that the first large-scale geodesic dome was made by faculty member Buckminster Fuller and students, where Merce Cunningham formed his dance company, and where John Cage staged his first musical happening . In the 1950s, the focus of the school shifted to

1349-553: The Atlantic , Naropa University , the University of California, Santa Cruz , and Marlboro College to The Evergreen State College , Hampshire College , Shimer College , Prescott College , Goddard College , World College West (1973–1992), and New College of Florida , among others, including Warren Wilson College located just minutes down the road from where Black Mountain College was located. Bennington College , based on

1420-488: The Central Modern Period that are still taught worldwide and numerous other types of modern dance exist today. Modern dance is often considered to have emerged as a rejection of, or rebellion against, classical ballet , although historians have suggested that socioeconomic changes in both the United States and Europe helped to initiate shifts in the dance world. In America, increasing industrialization ,

1491-674: The Cunningham Dance Foundation announced the Legacy Plan, a plan for the continuation of Cunningham's work and the celebration and preservation of his artistic legacy. Cunningham earned some of the highest honours bestowed in the arts, including the National Medal of Arts and the MacArthur Fellowship . He also received Japan's Praemium Imperiale and a British Laurence Olivier Award , and

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1562-687: The Early Modern period ( c. 1880–1923), characterized by the work of Isadora Duncan, Loie Fuller, Ruth St. Denis , Ted Shawn , and Eleanor King , artistic practice changed radically, but clearly distinct modern dance techniques had not yet emerged. In the Central Modern period ( c. 1923–1946), choreographers Martha Graham , Doris Humphrey , Katherine Dunham , Charles Weidman , and Lester Horton sought to develop distinctively American movement styles and vocabularies, and developed clearly defined and recognizable dance training systems. In

1633-673: The Merce Cunningham Dance Company was held March 15, 2012, in Cunningham's studio at the top of the Westbeth building in the West Village. There have been numerous exhibitions dedicated to Cunningham's work. Also, his visual art was represented by Margarete Roeder Gallery until her death on December 11, 2023. The major exhibition Invention: Merce Cunningham & Collaborators at the New York Public Library for

1704-798: The Performing Arts closed on October 13, 2007. Merce Cunningham: Dancing on the Cutting Edge , an exhibition of recent design for MCDC, opened at the Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami, in January 2007. A trio of exhibitions devoted to John Cage, Robert Rauschenberg, and Merce Cunningham, curated by Ron Bishop, was shown in the spring of 2002 at the Gallery of Fine Art, Edison College, Fort Myers, Florida. A major exhibition about Cunningham and his collaborations, curated by Germano Celant,

1775-749: The Service Building (Lawrence Kocher), the Science Building (Paul Williams, Dan Rice, and Stan Vanderbeek ), the Minimum House (designed by students), the Jalowetz House (Lawrence Kocher), and the Quiet House (a memorial to Mark Dreier designed by Alex "Bill" Reed). The property was later purchased and converted to an ecumenical Christian boys' residential summer camp ( Camp Rockmont ). This has been used for years as

1846-541: The US, and a number of them settled at Black Mountain, most notably Josef Albers , who was selected to run the art program, and his wife Anni Albers , who taught weaving and textile design. Adolf Hitler's rise to power and the subsequent persecution taking place in Europe led many artists and intellectuals to flee and resettle in the US, populating Black Mountain College with an influx of both students and faculty. In addition,

1917-403: The United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was considered to have been developed as a rejection of, or rebellion against, classical ballet , and also a way to express social concerns like socioeconomic and cultural factors. In the late 19th century, modern dance artists such as Isadora Duncan , Maud Allan , and Loie Fuller were pioneering new forms and practices in what

1988-597: The approach he used to create décor for several MCDC's early works, served as the company's resident designer from 1954 through 1964. Jasper Johns followed as Artistic Advisor from 1967 until 1980, and Mark Lancaster from 1980 through 1984. The last Advisors to be appointed were William Anastasi and Dove Bradshaw in 1984. Other artists who have collaborated with MCDC include Daniel Arsham , Tacita Dean , Liz Phillips , Rei Kawakubo , Roy Lichtenstein , Bruce Nauman , Ernesto Neto , Frank Stella , Benedetta Tagliabue , and Andy Warhol . John Cage and I became interested in

2059-470: The artistic work of Isadora Duncan, Maud Allan, and others the use of a form of dancing which strives to portray in movements what the music master expresses in his compositions—interpretative dancing." In Europe, Mary Wigman in Germany, Francois Delsarte , Émile Jaques-Dalcroze ( Eurhythmics ), and Rudolf Laban developed theories of human movement and expression, and methods of instruction that led to

2130-404: The arts, including Josef and Anni Albers , Ruth Asawa , John Cage , Robert Creeley , Merce Cunningham , Max Dehn , Elaine de Kooning , Willem de Kooning , Buckminster Fuller , Walter Gropius , Ray Johnson , Franz Kline , Robert Motherwell , Charles Olson , Robert Rauschenberg , M. C. Richards , Dorothea Rockburne , Michael Rumaker , Aaron Siskind and Cy Twombly . Although it

2201-526: The audience. Many modern dancers choose a subject near and dear to their hearts, such as a lost love or a personal failure. The dancer will choose music that relates to the story they wish to tell, or choose to use no music at all, and then choose a costume to reflect their chosen emotions." This list illustrates some important teacher-student relationships in modern dance. Black Mountain College Black Mountain College

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2272-711: The beginning of their solvency." African American dance blended modern dance with African and Caribbean movement (flexible torso and spine, articulated pelvis, isolation of the limbs, and polyrhythmic movement). Katherine Dunham trained in ballet, founded Ballet Negre in 1936 and then the Katherine Dunham Dance Company based in Chicago . In 1945, she opened a school in New York, teaching Katherine Dunham Technique , African and Caribbean movement integrated with ballet and modern dance. Taking inspiration from African-based dance where one part of

2343-435: The body plays against one another, she focused on articulating the torso in her choreography. Pearl Primus drew on African and Caribbean dances to create strong dramatic works characterized by large leaps. She often based her dances on the work of black writers and on racial issues, such as Langston Hughes 's 1944 The Negro Speaks of Rivers , and Lewis Allan's 1945 Strange Fruit (1945). Her dance company developed into

2414-484: The boundaries of "putting on a show", the removal of centre stage is an example of this—without a focal point for the audience, no one dancer or step holds the most value and can be seen as arbitrary ... or not. The Cunningham Dance Foundation announced the Legacy Plan (LLP) in June 2009. The Plan provided a roadmap for the future of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, as envisioned by Cunningham. The first of its kind in

2485-677: The campus of Centralia College , was created in honor of Cunningham. Cunningham continued to live in New York City and lead his dance company as Artistic Director until his death. He presented his last work, a new work, Nearly Ninety , in April 2009, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music , New York, to mark his 90th birthday. Later that year he died in his home at the age of 90. Cunningham formed Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) at Black Mountain College in 1953. Guided by its leader's radical approach to space, time and technology,

2556-464: The college was operating in the South during the period of legal racial segregation at other colleges and universities in the region. While not immune from racial tensions, the student Alma Stone Williams , an African-American woman who enrolled at Black Mountain College in 1944, is considered by some to be the first black student to enroll in an all-white institution of higher education in the South during

2627-588: The college's history and impact. The Journal of Black Mountain College Studies is a multidisciplinary open-access digital publication that publishes articles, essays, and creative work related to the school and the individuals associated with it. Black Mountain College was the subject of the museum exhibition Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933–1957, which opened at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston on October 10, 2015. The show

2698-519: The company has forged a distinctive style, reflecting Cunningham's technique and illuminating the near limitless possibility for human movement. The original company included dancers Carolyn Brown , Viola Farber , Marianne Preger-Simon , Paul Taylor , and Remy Charlip , and musicians John Cage and David Tudor . In 1964 the Cunningham Dance Foundation was established to support his work. MCDC made its first international tour in 1964, visiting Europe and Asia. From 1971 until its dissolution in 2012,

2769-687: The company was based in the Westbeth Artists Community in the West Village ; for a time Cunningham himself lived a block away at 107 Bank Street , with John Cage. On July 20, 1999, Merce Cunningham and Mikhail Baryshnikov performed together at the New York State Theater for Cunningham's 80th birthday. In its later years, the company had a two-year residency at Dia:Beacon , where MCDC performed Events , Cunningham's site-specific choreographic collages, in

2840-473: The continued development of modern dance in the United States and Europe. Moving into the 1960s, new ideas about dance began to emerge as a response to earlier dance forms and to social changes. Eventually, postmodern dance artists would reject the formalism of modern dance, and include elements such as performance art , contact improvisation , release technique , and improvisation. American modern dance can be divided (roughly) into three periods or eras. In

2911-467: The dance world, the plan represented Cunningham's vision for continuing his work in the upcoming years, transitioning his company once he was no longer able to lead it, and preserving his oeuvre. The Legacy Plan included a comprehensive digital documentation and preservation program, which ensures that pieces from his repertory can be studied, performed and enjoyed by future generations with knowledge of how they originally came to life. By other provisions of

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2982-663: The development of European modern and Expressionist dance . Other pioneers included Kurt Jooss ( Ausdruckstanz ) and Harald Kreutzberg . Disturbed by the Great Depression and the rising threat of fascism in Europe, the radical dancers tried to raise consciousness by dramatizing the economic , social , ethnic and political crises of their time. In 1915, Ruth St. Denis founded the Denishawn school and dance company with her husband Ted Shawn . Martha Graham , Doris Humphrey , and Charles Weidman were pupils at

3053-1052: The galleries of Richard Serra , Dan Flavin , and Sol LeWitt , among others. In 2007, MCDC premiered XOVER , Cunningham's final collaboration with Rauschenberg, at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. In 2009, MCDC premiered Cunningham's newest work, Nearly Ninety , at the Brooklyn Academy of Music . The company concluded its farewell tour on December 31, 2011, with a performance at the Park Avenue Armory . Merce Cunningham Dance Company frequently collaborated with visual artists, architects, designers, and musicians. Many of Cunningham's most famous innovations were developed in collaboration with composer John Cage , his life partner. Cunningham and Cage used chance procedures to generate material, discarding many artistic traditions of narrative and form. Famously, they asserted that dance and its music should not be intentionally coordinated with one another. John Cage, after his death,

3124-565: The literary arts under the rectorship of Charles Olson . Olson founded The Black Mountain Review in 1954 and, together with his colleague and student Robert Creeley , developed the poetic school of Black Mountain poets . Additionally, the College was an important incubator for the American avant-garde . Black Mountain proved to be an important precursor to and prototype for many of the alternative colleges of today, ranging from College of

3195-537: The plan, the Merce Cunningham Trust, established by Cunningham to serve as the custodian for his works, controls his dances for licensing purposes; Cunningham associates prepared detailed records of the dances so they could be licensed and given authentic productions by other companies. Besides, the plan outlined a final international tour for the company, and, ultimately, the closure of the Cunningham Dance Foundation and Merce Cunningham Dance Company and

3266-569: The product. Because of his strong interest in the creation of the choreography he used chance procedures in his work. A chance procedure means that the order of the steps or sequence is unknown until the actual performance and is decided by chance. For instance in his work Suite by Chance he used the toss of a coin to determine how to put the choreographed sequences together. Indeterminacy was another part of Cunningham's work. Many of his pieces had sections or sequences that were rehearsed so that they could be put in any order and done at any time. Although

3337-428: The rise of a middle class (which had more disposable income and free time), and the decline of Victorian social strictures led to, among other changes, a new interest in health and physical fitness. "It was in this atmosphere that a 'new dance' was emerging as much from a rejection of social structures as from a dissatisfaction with ballet." During that same period, "the champions of physical education helped to prepare

3408-885: The same philosophy, was founded one year before Black Mountain College. The school operated using non-hierarchical methodologies that placed students and educators on the same plane. Revolving around 20th-century ideals about the value and importance of balancing education, art, and cooperative labor, students were required to participate in farm work, construction projects, and kitchen duty as part of their holistic education. The students were involved at all levels of institutional decision-making. They were also left in charge of deciding when they were ready to graduate, which notoriously few ever did. There were no course requirements, official grades (except for transfer purposes), or accredited degrees. Graduates were presented with handcrafted diplomas as purely ceremonial symbols of their achievement. The liberal arts program offered at Black Mountain

3479-795: The school and members of the dance company. Seeking a wider and more accepting audience for their work, Duncan, Fuller, and Ruth St. Denis toured Europe . Martha Graham is often regarded as the founding mother of modern 20th-century concert dance . Graham viewed ballet as too one-sided: European , imperialistic , and un-American. She became a student at the Denishawn school in 1916 and then moved to New York City in 1923, where she performed in musical comedies , music halls , and worked on her own choreography . Graham developed her own dance technique , Graham technique , that hinged on concepts of contraction and release. In Graham's teachings, she wanted her students to "Feel". To "Feel", means having

3550-472: The school was unable to sustain itself financially given the greatly decreased number of students. In 1962, the school's books were finally closed, with all debts covered. The Black Mountain College Museum & Arts Center , founded in 1933, continues the legacy of Black Mountain College through talks, exhibitions, performances, collection and preservation, and an annual fall conference that examines

3621-519: The second of three sons. Both of his brothers followed their father, Clifford D. Cunningham, into the legal profession. Cunningham first experienced dance while living in Centralia. He took tap dance class from a local teacher, Mrs Maude Barrett, whose energy and spirit taught him to love dance. Her emphasis on precise musical timing and rhythm provided him with a clear understanding of musicality that he implemented in his later dance pieces. He attended

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3692-643: The site of the Black Mountain Festival, the Lake Eden Arts Festival (LEAF), and Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center 's {Re}HAPPENING. A number of the original structures are still in use as lodgings or administrative facilities, and two frescoes painted by Jean Charlot remain intact on the site. Black Mountain College closed in 1957, eight years after Albers left to direct the first design department at Yale . The college suspended classes by court order due to debts;

3763-467: The stage; it need not even be frontally oriented, but can be viewed from any angle (at performances in Cunningham's studio, for instance, audiences are seated in an L-shaped configuration). The viewer's focus is never directed to a particular spot; he must often decide among many centres of activity. Merce Cunningham saw randomness and arbitrariness as positive qualities because they exist in real life. Most of Cunningham's choreographic process works to break

3834-466: The transfer of all assets to the Merce Cunningham Trust. From Merce's death at age 90 through the Board's last meeting in 2012, the Legacy Plan implemented his wish that the company complete a worldwide legacy tour and then close. The final performance of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company was on December 31, 2011, at the Park Avenue Armory in New York City. The final meeting of the board of directors for

3905-664: The use of chance in the 50s. I think one of the very primary things that happened then was the publication of the " I Ching ", the Chinese book of changes, from which you can cast your fortune: the hexagrams. Cage took it to work in his way of making compositions then; and he used the idea of 64—the number of the hexagrams —to say that you had 64, for example, sounds; then you could cast, by chance, to find which sound first appeared, cast again, to say which sound came second, cast again, so that it's done by, in that sense, chance operations. Instead of finding out what you think should follow—say

3976-720: The use of chance operations was considered an abrogation of artistic responsibility, Cunningham was thrilled by a process that arrives at works that could never have been created through traditional collaboration. This does not mean, however, that Cunningham considered every piece created in this fashion a masterpiece. Those dances that did not "work" were quickly dropped from the repertory, while those that did were celebrated as serendipitous discoveries. Cunningham used "non-representational" choreography which simply emphasizes movement, and does not necessarily represent any historical narrative, emotional situation, or idea. Such non-representational dance appears in many styles throughout history, but

4047-592: The viewpoint of a movement specialist rather than as a reviewer of music or drama. Educators accepted modern dance into college and university curricula, first as a part of physical education, then as performing art. Many college teachers were trained at the Bennington Summer School of the Dance, established at Bennington College in 1934. Of the Bennington program, Agnes de Mille wrote, "...there

4118-423: The way for modern dance, and gymnastic exercises served as technical starting points for young women who longed to dance." Women's colleges began offering "aesthetic dance" courses by the end of the 1880s. Emil Rath , who wrote at length about this emerging art form at the time stated, "Music and rhythmic bodily movement are twin sisters of art, as they have come into existence simultaneously...today we see in

4189-504: Was a private liberal arts college in Black Mountain, North Carolina . It was founded in 1933 by John Andrew Rice , Theodore Dreier, and several others. The college was ideologically organized around John Dewey 's educational philosophy, which emphasized holistic learning and the study of art as central to a liberal arts education . Many of the college's faculty and students were or would go on to become highly influential in

4260-443: Was a fine commingling of all kinds of artists, musicians, and designers, and secondly, because all those responsible for booking the college concert series across the continent were assembled there. ... free from the limiting strictures of the three big monopolistic managements, who pressed for preference of their European clients. As a consequence, for the first time American dancers were hired to tour America nationwide, and this marked

4331-511: Was broad, and supplemented by art making as a means of cultivating creative thinking within all fields. While Josef Albers led the school, the only two requirements were a course on materials and form taught by Albers and a course on Plato. In 1933, the Nazis shut down the Bauhaus in Germany, a similarly progressive arts-based educational institution. Many of the school's faculty left Europe for

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4402-543: Was created by using playing cards. Each movement was assigned a playing card and chosen randomly. Cunningham's lifelong passion for exploration and innovation made him a leader in applying new technologies to the arts. He began investigating dance on film in the 1970s, and after 1991 choreographed using the computer program LifeForms, a software made by Zella Wolofsky , Tom Calvert, and Thecla Schiphorst . Cunningham explored motion capture technology with digital artists Paul Kaiser and Shelley Eshkar to create Hand-drawn Spaces ,

4473-887: Was first seen at the Fundació Antoni Tàpies in Barcelona in 1999, and subsequently at the Fundação de Serralves, Porto, Portugal, 1999; the Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna, 2000; and the Museo d'Arte Contemporanea, Castello di Rivoli, Turin, 2000. Cunningham choreographed almost 200 works for his company. Modern dance Modern dance is a broad genre of western concert or theatrical dance which includes dance styles such as ballet, folk, ethnic, religious, and social dancing; and primarily arose out of Europe and

4544-455: Was marked by social and cultural experimentation in the arts. Choreographers no longer created specific 'schools' or 'styles'. The influences from different periods of dance became more vague and fragmented. Contemporary dance emerged in the 1950s as the dance form that is combining the modern dance elements and the classical ballet elements. It can use elements from non-Western dance cultures, such as African dancing with bent knees as

4615-650: Was named Officier of the Légion d'honneur in France. Cunningham's life and artistic vision have been the subject of numerous books, films, and exhibitions, and his works have been presented by groups including the Paris Opéra Ballet , New York City Ballet , American Ballet Theatre , White Oak Dance Project , and London's Rambert Dance Company . Merce Cunningham was born in Centralia, Washington , in 1919,

4686-413: Was not commonly used by ballet or Martha Graham , Cunningham's primary influences. In the use of chance procedures, Cunningham abandoned the more traditional structured form of dance. He did not believe that dance needs a beginning, middle or end. In Sixteen Dances for Soloist and Company of Three (1951), Cunningham used Indeterminacy for the first time in this piece; the changing element for each show

4757-623: Was one of the first choreographers to begin experimenting with film. He created an original work for the video Westbeth (1974) in collaboration with filmmaker Charles Atlas The computer program later became DanceForms and uses avatars of dancers with color-coded limbs as a platform for choreography. In 2009, Cunningham's interest in new media led to the creation of the behind-the-scenes webcast Mondays with Merce . The use of stage space also changed in Cunningham's choreography. The "front and centre" spot traditionally coveted by soloists no longer exists in his works. Dance can take place on any part of

4828-471: Was originally funded through a $ 10,000 gift from "Mac" Forbes, a former Rollins College faculty member, after the founders were unable to raise funds from traditional sources. Black Mountain was experimental in nature and committed to an interdisciplinary approach, prioritizing art-making as a necessary component of education and attracting a faculty and lecturers that included many of America's leading visual artists, composers, poets, and designers. During

4899-604: Was quite notable during its lifetime, the school closed in 1957 after 24 years due to funding issues; Camp Rockmont for Boys now sits on the campus' site. The history and legacy of Black Mountain College are preserved and extended by the Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center , located in downtown Asheville , North Carolina. Black Mountain College was founded in 1933 by John Andrew Rice , Theodore Dreier, Frederick Georgia, and Ralph Lounsbury, who were dismissed as faculty from Rollins College in

4970-563: Was succeeded in the role of music director by David Tudor . After 1995, MCDC's music director was Takehisa Kosugi . MCDC commissioned more work from contemporary composers than any other dance company. Its repertory included works by musicians ranging from Cage and Gordon Mumma to Gavin Bryars , as well as popular bands like Radiohead , Sigur Rós and Sonic Youth . The company also collaborated with an array of visual artists and designers. Robert Rauschenberg , whose famous "Combines" reflect

5041-449: Was the sequence of the sections. In Field Dances (1963), Cunningham experimented with giving the dancer more freedom. Each dancer was given a sequence of movements with which they could do as they pleased. This included exiting and entering at will, executing it in any order and as many times as desired. In Story (1963), Cunningham experimented with the variables of costumes and sets. Before each performance dancers chose an outfit from

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