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Modern dance

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picture of Isadora Duncan - Source: Library of Congress
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picture of Isadora Duncan - Source: Library of Congress

Modern dance is a dance form developed in the early 20th century. Although the term Modern dances has also been applied to a category of 20th Century ballroom dances, Modern dance as a term usually refers to 20th century concert dance.

In the early 1900s a few dancers in Europe started to rebel against the rigid constraints of Classical Ballet. Shedding classical ballet technique, costume and shoes these early modern dance pioneers practiced free dance.

In America Loie Fuller, Isadora Duncan, Ruth St. Denis, Alvin Ailey and Martha Graham developed their own styles of free dance and laid the foundations of American modern dance with their choreography and teaching.

In Europe Mary Wigman, Rudolf Laban, Émile Jaques-Dalcroze, and Francois Delsarte developed theories of human movement and methods of instruction that led to the development of European modern and Expressionist dance.

Contents

History

Free dance

main article: Free dance

Fuller, Duncan and St. Denis all toured Europe seeking a wider and more accepting audience for their work. Only Ruth St. Denis returned to the United States to continue her work, Isadora Duncan died in Paris in 1927 and Fuller's work received little support outside Europe.

Early modern dance

In 1915 Ruth St. Denis founded the Denishawn school and dance company with her husband Ted Shawn. Whilst St. Denis was responsible for most of the creative work, Shawn was responsible for teaching technique and composition. Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey, and Charles Weidman where all pupils at the school and members of the dance company.

After shedding the techniques and compositional methods of their teachers the early modern dancers developed their own methods and ideologies and dance techniques which became the foundation for modern dance practice.

European modern and expressionist dance

See also: Expressionist dance and Ausdruckstanz

Dance as art

In 1927 newspapers regularly began assigning dance critics, such as Walter Terry, and Edwin Denby, who approached performances from 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, which was established at Bennington College in 1934.

Development of Modern Dance

While the founders on modern dance continued to make works based on ancient myths and legends following a narrative structure, their students the radical dancers saw dance as a potential agent of change. Disturbed by the great depression and the rising threat of fascism in Europe, they tried to raise consciousness by dramatizing the economic, social, ethnic and political crises of their time.

  • Erick Hawkins - a student of George Balanchine Hawkins became a soloist and the first male dancer in Martha Graham's dance company. In 1951 Hawkins, interested in the new field of kinesiology, opened his own school and developed his own technique (Hawkins technique) a fore-runner of somatic dance techniques.
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    African-American modern dance
    

The development of Modern dance embraced the contributions of African-American dance artists regardless of whether they made pure modern dance works or blended modern dance with African and Caribbean influences.
    


    



    Legacy of Modern dance
    

The legacy on 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 and Contemporary dance
    

Both Postmodern dance and Contemporary dance built upon the foundations laid by Modern dance and form part of the greater category of 20th century concert dance. Where as Postmodern dance was a direct and opposite response to Modern dance, Contemporary dance draws on both modern and postmodern dance as a source of inspiration. 
    

see also:Postmodern dance, Contemporary dance, and 20th century concert dance
    

Modern dance is also one of the nine movement forms incorporated into Nia (Neuromuscular Integrative Action).
    


    lineage 20th century concert dance
    


    

    sketch showing lineage of 20th century concert dance ©-cc-by Ohka-

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sketch showing lineage of 20th century concert dance ©-cc-by Ohka-
    

    

    


note: this sketch is provided for illustrative purposes only.
    


    teachers and students
    

This list illustrates the basic teacher / student links in modern dance. For more detailed information see the individual artists entries. 
    


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    Further information
    


    See also
    


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    Further reading
    


    
Modernism 

    
20th century - Modernity - Existentialism

    
Modernism (music): 20th century classical music - Atonality - Jazz

    
Modernist literature - Modernist poetry

    
Modern art - Symbolism (arts) - Impressionism - Expressionism - Cubism -   Surrealism - Dadaism - Futurism (art)

    
Modern dance - Expressionist dance

    
Modern architecture - Brutalism - De Stijl - Functionalism - Futurism - International Style - Organicism - Visionary architecture

    
...Preceded by Romanticism
Followed by Post-modernism...

    
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