Modern Dance History (http://sfperformances.org/education/studyguides/SFP_Dance_booklet.pdf)
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The first American stage is lit with the invention of electricity
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Loie Fuller performs 'The Serpentine' in New York. She experiments with shape by manipulating her costumes and lighting.
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Modern Dance emerges in America when choreographers and dancers begin to rebel against traditional baller and its rigid formalism.
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Isadora Duncan establishes the first school of Modern Dance in Berlin. Inspired by ancient Greek civilization, she moves in a style that she calls "free dance." She believes dance to be and expression of inner emotion, an idea used and developed by future dancers and choreographers.
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Ruth St. Denis & Ted Shawn establish the Denishawn school in Los Angeles where Martha Graham and Doris Humphrey study. St. Denis forms her own style, studying places such as Egypt and the Orient and creating emotionally expressive story dance
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Women's sufferage is established constitutionally, and Marth Graham makes her debut in Ted Shawn's Xochitl.
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Martha Graham performs independently for the first time in New York. Graham develops a technique centered around psychological investigation.
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First publication of Dance Magazine (as The American Dancer) under the direction of Ruth Eleanor Howard.
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Lester Horton establishes the Horton Dance Company in LA. He develops a technique using the torso as the center of all movement in the body, incorporating stretched-out body lines, diagonals, and long balances.
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Ted Shawn founds Jacobs Pillow Dance Festival and his troupe of Men Dancers. This group paves the future for men in modern dance and they tour the country until 1940.
Busby Berkeley’s 42nd Street features kaleidoscopic production numbers in movie theaters across America. -
American Dance Festival, a summer school for modern dance, founded by Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey, Charles Weidman, and Hanya Holm
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Alwin Nikolais creates his first choreographic work. In 1948 he became the head of the dance department at Henry Street Playhouse and developed a children’s theater. Nikolais attempts to portray humans in an environment surrounded by other humans, by nature and by other external artifacts. He is interested in both social psychology and technology and attempts to combine the two.
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Paul Taylor begins to create his own choreography.
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Graham premieres Appalachian Spring
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Katherine Dunham opens the Dunham School of Dance & Theater in Manhattan, teaching ballet, modern, and Afro-Cuban dance.
Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman create their own company and school. Jose Limon forms the Limon Dance Company and Humphrey choreographs for the company. -
Erick Hawkins establishes his own company after breaking away from work with Graham. He incorporates Buddhist thought and Greek philosophy in his choreography
An American in Paris, with Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron—the high point for dance in the movies, along with Singin’ in the Rain the following year. -
Merce Cunningham creates his own company and begins to experiment with the concept of chance and abstraction. He rebels against Graham’s focus on the emotional human experience
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Paul Taylor creates his own dance company. His choreography is known for exceptional musicality and variety.
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Alvin Ailey establishes the American Dance Theater. Ailey’s choreographic style fuses ballet, jazz and modern techniques. His dances entertain while celebrating athleticism, theatricality and the tradition of black dance
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First concert in NYC’s Judson Memorial Church marks the beginning of the Judson movement and postmodern dance. Artists involved include Meredith Monk, Trisha Brown, Lucinda Childs, David Gordon, Steve Paxton and Yvonne Rainer. These artists are interested in pushing the limits of performance dance. They experiment with very minimalist and pedestrian movements, asking questions such as “what is dance?” and “what is a dancer?”
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Twyla Tharp forms her own company after dancing for three years with Paul Taylor. She works within the lack of discipline during the 1960’s while presenting a synthesis of ideas of dance concerning space and time.
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Paul Taylor Dance Foundation establishe
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Trisha Brown forms her own dance company. Her choreography is structured and incorporates an energetic flow of movements. Garth Fagan establishes his own company in Rochester, NY.
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Pilobolus Dance Theatre formed. This is a small group of dancers that uses “linkage” to blend bodies together. Dancers bodies meld into one another with gymnastic movements and shapes.
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Premiere of Paul Taylor’s, Esplanade.
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First broadcast of Dance in America, a public television program featuring masterpieces of the dance repertory.
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Founding of Isadora Duncan International Institute, a global organization committed to the enhancement of education through movement and the arts, drawing from the ideals and principles of Isadora Duncan.
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Elizabeth Streb forms her company, STREB. Her work is very acrobatic and physical.
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Mark Morris establishes the Mark Morris Dance Group. He choreographs primarily to classical music, creating movements based on the musical score.
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MOMIX founded under direction of Moses Pendleton. Momix is very theatrical. The dancers’ bodies are used to create forms and shape.
Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company founded. Much of the work of Bill T. Jones focuses on social and political issues as well as personal narration. -
Jawole Willa Jo Zollar founds Urban Bush Women, a performance ensemble that combines dance, music, text, and imagery to explore cultural and social issues.
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David Parsons forms the Parsons Dance Company
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AXIS Dance Company, which focuses on physically integrated dance by performers with and without disabilities, formed in Oakland.
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Trisha Brown awarded a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship. First female choreographer to be given this honor
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Dance Theater Workshop, founded by choreographers Jeff Duncan, Jack Moore, and Art Bauman to provide emerging dancemakers a place to create new works, celebrates 30 years of successful presenting in NYC.
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Still/Here, a multi-media meditation on untimely death created by Bill T. Jones, generates great acclaim and controversy about “victim art.
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Chicago, the film adaptation of the musical featuring Bob Fosse’s distinctive movement, wins the Academy Award for Best Picture, capping the Fosse revival of the late 90s.