Merce Cunningham: some newspaper article or scholarly journal article

Besides talking about Merce Cunningham himself, I think we should know about the company he hold and something that after he died.







MERCE CUNNINGHAM DANCE COMPANY

Born in Centralia, Washington on April 16, 1919, Merce Cunningham was a leader of the American avant-garde whose constant innovation and artistic collaborations expanded the frontiers not only of dance, but also of contemporary visual and performing arts. Cunningham began his professional modern dance career at 20 with a six-year tenure as a soloist in the Martha Graham Dance Company. In 1944 he presented his first solo concert and in 1953 formed the legendary Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) as a forum to explore his groundbreaking ideas.

MERCE CUNNINGHAM TRUST

The Merce Cunningham Trust was established in 2000 to hold and administer the rights to the work of Merce Cunningham, which encompasses more than 150 dances and over 800 "Events" created over the course of his sixty-five year career. In 2002, the Trust was recognized by the IRS as a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation, with the mission to preserve, enhance and maintain the integrity of the choreographic and other artistic works of Merce Cunningham, and make such works available for the benefit of the public.

    These two article are based on http://www.mercecunningham.org/ which is a credible website only for Merce Cunningham. We should know that without his works and dance output, he still leave many many things in the world.  

X Factor: Merce Cunningham's collaborator----John Cage

JOHN CAGE: John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer, music theorist, writer, and artist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde. Critics have lauded him as one of the most influential American composers of the 20th century. He was also instrumental in the development of modern dance, mostly through his association with choreographer Merce Cunningham, who was also Cage's romantic partner for most of their lives.

John Cage first met Merce Cunningham in 1938 at the Cornish School in Seattle. At the time Cage was married to a woman and the couple allegedly had an open relationship and they were both attracted to the younger male dancer. Cage soon realized he was more attracted to Cunningham than to his wife Xenia and the two soon moved together to New York City. Their first collaboration together was "Credo in Us" in 1942.

My own thought about Merce Cunningham

In my opinion, I could accept both of the "after Cunningham dance" and "before Cunningham dance?" Because of the changing times, Whatever dancer or audiences would have some different viewpoints in the DANCE FIELD. Merce Cunningham is just a representative person. 

    His most key idea is that Movement is expressive and enough beyond any intention. There’s no need to tell a story or reflect something.

In my opinion, it is a nice viewpoint. Because before this thought appears, the whole field of art may in a situation that let audiences enjoy the performance should be the most important things. But Merce Cunningham's idea shows that art should respect the art itself.  Maybe the dance would let audiences confused or puzzled, but if only the dance shows the spirit of the performance, it is enough. I think choreographer or dancer could explain to the audiences if there is something make them confused.
    Another point that i want to talk is about creative freedom. This is another point that claimed by Cunningham. In my opinion, art is the spiritual thing, there should be not a frame or limitation. But maybe before Cunningham claimed this point, some of the dance would be used in some political situation or social things. It may not show the dance itself but also have some other meaning. It would influence the dance's spirit.
    This two points is my favorite points so that i like share my thougtht to you guys~ More idea could see in the previous post.

Merce Cunningham change the dance field.

For contemporary dance history there’s a ‘before Cunningham and after Cunningham’. His work marks the time for a completely new era of dance and gains it the inscription inside the story of contemporary art with the same status as other arts.
Here is some key ideas from Merce Cunningham:

• Dramaturgical and compositional perspective:

-intention. There’s no need to tell a story or reflect something.

-No figurative or emotional references.

-Away from the need of communicating something, from pre-established formal elements or coming from an interior impulse.

-To compose in space and time without a goal.

-Immobility (as silence) is a sufficient aesthetical experience.

-Chance as a method for making aesthetical choices: throwing coins or dice, using the ‘I Ching’.

-Multiple and simultaneous actions.


• Musical perspective:

-Independence between dance and music.


• Scenic frame perspective:

-Deconstruction of rules of perspective and symmetry defined by court ballet: breaking of scenic space conceptions of front, center and hierarchies: space is equal at any point, Abstraction: Movement is expressive and enough beyond any fragmented and exploded.

-No hierarchy between dancers.

-The audience is free to see in its own manner and with its own looking choices.

-Out of theaters: non conventional spaces.

-Inventor of the ‘EVENT’: sequence of dances whose dramatic structure or content is never stable, with no sense of logical syntax or construction (ancestor of what is later called happening).


• Technical-interpretative perspective:

-Virtuous dancers in a new sense.

-Mastery of tempo and movement length by inner perception.

-Ability to dance with great speed and changing of rhythm and directions in an unpredictable way.

-Capability of adapting and memorizing sequences.

-Rhythmical diversity without equivalent.

-Classical technique for the legs.


• Philosophical perspective:

-Abandonment of the ideas of the ‘inspired artist’, the piece of art as an expression of an individual and an evaluation criterion based on beauty or expressive qualities.

-Order inside disorder.

-Never the two same ‘events’: not about fixing, but about reflecting flexibility of life.

-Reflecting life: no linearity, no classical dramaturgy, things don´t happen only in a successive way but also simultaneously.

-No politics, no narrative, no argument, no theme, no intention.

-Creative freedom.

-ZEN influence: “non obstructive quality” of things, they can coexist in nature without interfering with each other.

-Dance to be danced or to be seen, not to be analyzed.

Here is an example shows that after Cunningham dance should be like what form:

Beach Birds for Camera

Merce Cunningham

Background: Merce Cunningham (April 16, 1919 – July 26, 2009) was an American dancer and choreographer who was at the forefront of the American modern dance for more than 50 years. He is one of the most controversy and impactive dancer and choreographer. Through much of his life, he was also one of the greatest American dancers. With an artistic career distinguished by constant innovation, Cunningham expanded the frontiers not only of dance, but also of contemporary visual and performing arts. His collaborations with artistic innovators from every creative discipline have yielded an unparalleled body of American dance, music, and visual art.

Of all his collaborations, Cunningham’s work with John Cage, his life partner from the 1940s until Cage’s death in 1992, had the greatest influence on his practice. Together, Cunningham and Cage proposed a number of radical innovations. The most famous and controversial of these concerned the relationship between dance and music, which they concluded may occur in the same time and space, but should be created independently of one another.For Cunningham the subject of his dances was always dance itself.

Here is an example that how Cunningham's dance looks like:

Roaratorio (1986) at BAM