Since the founding of New York City people from all around the world have flocked there in search of a better reality and fulfillment of their dreams. Some of them found what they were looking for and others did not. Nevertheless, the constant fluctuation of masses from every corner of the world to New York City only increased in the course of time. At the beginning of a new era filled with hectic and rushing, this city has become a symbol for movement, regardless of its form and purpose. The spatial, financial, cultural movement, the movement of information or myriad of immigrants is of essence in this city. Movement in space and time is in its every shape also the primary subject matter of Terpsihora´s art- the dance. Aside from that, dance as art discipline focuses on the human body using it as clay in its “moulding“ process just like the city “moulds“ in a certain way its inhabitants. The founder of Modern dance for men in America, Ted Shawn, is said to have commented: “Dance is the only art of which we ourselves are the stuff of which it is made“. When it is taken into consideration that the energy of movement in all its forms in New York City relates to the energy of movement in dance, it is not curious at all that a number of dancing styles have been developed or have experienced an incredible flourishing in New York City. The striving to pursue an artistic career in this city is for a lot of dancers the sheer energy for dancing itself. Their life motto - `If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere'. The sublime relationship between the city and the artist and the overwhelming impression New York City gives on an artist is very perspicuously ilustrated in a comment of the young architectural critic Lewis Mumford:
The world, at that moment, opened before me, challenging me, beckoning me, demanding something of me ... Here was my city, immense, overpowering, flooded with energy and light ... transmitting through me the great mysterious will ... and the promise of the new day that was still to come (Lewis Mumford 1982:130).
Contents:
1. Introducti.
2. Dance development in New York Ci.
3. Connection Artist/Dancer-Ci.
4. Hollywood´s image of New York´s dance sce.
5. 9/11 in the dance wor.
6. Conclusio.
1. Introduction
Since the founding of New York City people from all around the world have flocked there in search of a better reality and fulfillment of their dreams. Some of them found what they were looking for and others did not. Nevertheless, the constant fluctuation of masses from every corner of the world to New York City only increased in the course of time. At the beginning of a new era filled with hectic and rushing, this city has become a symbol for movement, regardless of its form and purpose. The spatial, financial, cultural movement, the movement of information or myriad of immigrants is of essence in this city. Movement in space and time is in its every shape also the primary subject matter of Terpsihora´s art- the dance. Aside from that, dance as art discipline focuses on the human body using it as clay in its “moulding“ process just like the city “moulds“ in a certain way its inhabitants. The founder of Modern dance for men in America, Ted Shawn, is said to have commented: “Dance is the only art of which we ourselves are the stuff of which it is made“. When it is taken into consideration that the energy of movement in all its forms in New York City relates to the energy of movement in dance, it is not curious at all that a number of dancing styles have been developed or have experienced an incredible flourishing in New York City. The striving to pursue an artistic career in this city is for a lot of dancers the sheer energy for dancing itself. Their life motto - `If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere'. The sublime relationship between the city and the artist and the overwhelming impression New York City gives on an artist is very perspicuously ilustrated in a comment of the young architectural critic Lewis Mumfor.
The world, at that moment, opened before me, challenging me, beckoning me, demanding something of me ... Here was my city, immense, overpowering, flooded with energy and light ... transmitting through me the great mysterious will ... and the promise of the new day that was still to come (Lewis Mumford 1982:130.
The aim of this paper is to depict the development and transformation of dancers and theatrical dance forms in New York City as a reflection of the city´s evolution, because although dancers have an aesthetic function as their major role in a society, they also have a large impact on the community from which they draw their experience by implementing social and political topics in their work. Furthermore, the paper will elaborate on the creative progresses and processes that have brought about establishment of a number of unique dance expressions, which are, basically, a reflection of New York´s ingenious vigor. Hollywood´s focus on the New York´s dance millieu will be also considered by analyzing the performers´ determination and strive for sucess and fame at any price in the “Big Apple“ in the movies Fame (1979) and Center Stage (2000). In the end, a thought would be given to the subject of the impact of terror on the dance world and the changes in this area after the 11th of September, 2001 as well as the artists´ role in the society in moments like that. The focus on these aspects should give an individual answer to the phenomena of New York City´s preeminence at the world art stage and its reflection on the creative work of its versatile array of artist.
2. Dance development in New York City
New York artists lived in the city; they confronted it daily, and when successful, they became public figures, subject to scrutiny and judgment. Their work was never simply their art. It was also New York´s art (William B. Scott & Peter M. Rutkoff 1999:xviii.
Dance as an art form reflects its times and surroundings. Therefore, it is important to take a look at American dance history whose roots lie in New York´s dance history and the creation of such dance styles as: modern, postmodern and contemporary to name the most important in order to understand the influence of the city´s life and events on its versatile art forms. At the turn of the twentieth century, dance in New York was represented on one side by the few scarcely spread New York dance companies led by European ballet masters that took on the European ballet technique and the repertoire of romantic ballets and thus tried to refine further an exquisite European “imported product“ and on the other opposite by Broadway´s diverse shows and vaudeville theaters, mainly intended for light entertainment and commercial purposes. This dual in New York´s dance world demonstrates the unequal balance of the old world´s traditional art and the new world´s dance impulse, which served as a solid basis for the further development of dance in the city. As a matter of fact, the tension between the two opposite sources of inspiration - European sophistication and domestic originality was present in the other art directions as well and it has marked the development of the arts in general in the United States of America. (J. Kelly Robison (ed) 1999:4) New York´s art scene was, in fact, a downsized picture of the city and its citizens. In the dance world, on one side was the strict convention of bourgeoise ballet and on the other side were the freethinking choreographers who fought against tradition and for that matter against social, racial or any other confinements in the art world using their creative work to voice out these opinions. However, the performing world did not preserve this balance between its two opposite ends for a long time, since the incremental growth of industrialization dictated a reform especially of the city´s structure and with that of the art and its creators, as even then in New York nothing ever remained unchanged. These changes evoked eclecticism in the performance and opening up of New York´s theater world even more for those who had aspiration to be part of it, but even then this meant a battle for a prestigious place in a theater company, since women had yet to prove their right to be professional instead of only avocational performers.1 Thus, the developing egalitarianism in the art world was still a right that had to be hard-earned and the fight for that right brought forth the inception of the socalled “New York or bust“ attitude- the urge to dance in this particular city and nowhere else in the worl.
A contemporary of this world - the writer John Dos Passos brings the prevalent atmosphere in the dance world into being in his novel Manhattan Transfer (1925) in the character of Ruth - a struggling young dancer in a desperate search for a dance assignment in New York. Her determination to find such a position and stay in New York despite all odds is reflected in the way she leads her life in the city and is described at best in one of her comments: “I wont go out of New York whatever happens.“(John Dos Passos 2000:237). John Dos Passos presents through this character a fragmentational point of view by depicting merely the dream for an artistic career but not the fulfillment of this dream and concentrating only on the process of searching for possibilitie.
In the rapidly changing reality of an industrialized world, the demand rised for artists who seeked another way to express their feelings, ideas and ideals and who could perceive the potential and the unique subjects that the developing country offered. The auspicious ground for these artists was, of course, New York City, since the city offered a shelter and motivation for open-minded individuals with modern and unorthodox views. Although Broadway was considered and intended not to aspire to high artistical standards, it provided firsthand opportunities for creative processes and thus, served to the founders of modern dance Ruth St. Denis and Isadora Duncan as a springboard. A new revolutionary chapter in the dance history begins with these choreographers, who departed from Broadway´s entertainment character and choreographed dance scores, in which dancers were presented as “artists, not erotic entertainers.“(William B. Scott & Peter M. Rutkoff 1999:28). Dance was no longer seen as an aesthetic form void of social and political context available to a limited audience, who could afford the pleasure of it. The new dance pieces placed emphasis on the naturalness of the movement without losing the artistic refinement and gradually gained acknowledgment from a larger audience. This success led Ruth St. Denis and Isadora Duncan to present their performances in the much valued Carnegie Hall and the Metropolitan Opera House (William B. Scott & Peter M. Rutkoff 1999:32) securing in this way a place for the new dance style in the city´s art collage. That is probably the reason why the authors William B. Scott and Peter M. Rutkoff see modern dance´s inception on Broadway´s stage and name it - a child of Broadway ( William B. Scott & Peter M. Rutkoff 1999:27.
The second wave of dance pioneers appeared in the time period between the two world wars as part of an artistic generation with the ambition to influence profound changes on a larger scale. The dance world showed an affinity toward the American folk dance forms and their incorporation in the creative processes of that time. The New York based choreographer Martha Graham transformed the previous experimental forms in a revolutionary dance style, setting up the technical scheme and vocabulary for it. She expanded the horizons of a limited traditional viewpoint with her choreographies and set a milestone in New York´s dance milieu and the world ´s cultural history of what would be later known as American dance and thus, foreshadowed the direction the art world will take after her. The acknowldegment Graham got for creating a national art form is immense, primarily because what she created was according to the acclaimed magazine Dance Observer “the only dance form 'created in America, by Americans, for Americans' “(Ellen Graff 1997:138). However, Graham´s significance cannot be descerned only as a pivotal figure in the American dance history, who began separating the European expression form from the newly developed American form. Her profound influence should be seen out of the frames of the art world in the larger field of American general history as she used New York´s national variety to extract the essence of an American national identity in one of her ballets “American document“ and thus contributed greatly to the forming of American ideals. Ellen Graff states in her novel: “ In a time when American solidarity was essential, Graham´s work confirmed the uniqueness of the American experience [...]“(Ellen Graff 1997:129.
Another profound influence of the New York dancers on the development of dance in the United States of America is the setting up of a Federal Dance Project (Ellen Graff 1997:76) at the time of global economic crisis in the 1930s, when the artists suffered even more than the ordinary people, but were, however, the ones responsible for maintaing the spirit and morale in the city and wider in the countr.
It was at this time that a major turnover took place in American dance art, as the American dance form commenced penetrating in the classical ballet, which till then was considered as an exclusive European art expression. The Harvard educated poet and philanthropist Lincoln Kirstein founded with the help of the Russian choreographer George Balanchine a derived form of classical ballet presented in the repertoire of their company which would become later -the exquisite New York City Ballet that expanded at the same pace as its city and achieved its supremacy over the year.
This dance company is deemed ever since its formation a vital force in American dance and an essential component of American cultural life carrying nowadays the attitude as one of the foremost dance companies in the world; a unique organization in the artistic history of the United States.2
After all the progressive changes in the dance world, the need arised for an academic training in the variety of dance styles that established their own distinctive technical vocabulary. New York´s mayor Fiorello La Guardia (1882-1947) (Thomas Kessner 1991) supported the idea of specialized high school programs such as performing art programs3 and with this project pathed the way to a professional career to thousands of performing art students in the generations that followed. Shortly after this historical event, “Julliard, the prestigious musical school, opened its doors to college-age dancers in 1952.“ (Ellen Graff 1997:171). These programs set a milestone for the development of new dance forms worldwide, as the earlier created forms were acknowledged by being placed in professional frames and a space was left for the ones to com.
The next eminent New York art generation was bound to operate in tumultuos times branded by the pressure of the Cold War in the 1960s. This socalled New York avant- garde tried to voice out its opinions through its work and struggle against the political influence on its creative existence (William B. Scott & Peter M. Rutkoff 1999:314). The most important representative of this generation in the dance world was Merce Cunningham, who just like his famous predecors related the urge to create new dance movements in correspondence with the contemporary events and gave an immense contribution to the dance community by enriching dance with a new expression -the contemporary dance. In the spirit of his art generation, Merce Cunningham abandoned some conventional concepts of dance and placed an accent on dance as an independent form that can exist freely even without music. Cunnnigham´s potential and originality as a choreographer earned him the title of the greatest living choreographer at the turn of the twentieth century.4
The times that followed were expressed through the postmodern movement in architecture, theatre, literature and dance which was a reaction to the experienced political times and simultaneously a synthesis of everything that has been done at the art field up to that time. In New York City this as a powerful creative force in the forming of eclectical abounding art forms and artistic figures in New Yok, reinventing mainly the cultural heritage of the city. The eclecticism seems to be affected, in first line, from the changes in the architecture. Kenneth Frampton describes the position of architecture in this period in his article „Kritischer RegionalismusThesen zu einer Architektur des Widerstands.
[...]
1 See William B. Scott & Peter M. Rutkoff. New York Modern: the Arts and the City. Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 197.
2 www.nycballet.com.10.12.200.
3 Alan Parker . Fame (musical). Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer: 1979. -Bonus material.
3 www.merce.org.10.12.200.
- Citation du texte
- Aleksandra Pendarovska (Auteur), 2005, The dance world in New York, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/41250
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