Vitro Nasu

Dancing Voices Meredith Monk (previous post)

Literature for a Lockdown

Corradp Cagli, Vittorio Rieti,Tanaquil LeClercq George Balanchine -the Ballet Society; Photo by Irving Penn

Edward Gorey

What did Gorey appreciate about Balanchine’s work?

He had a real artistic genius’ ability to zero in on genius in other artists, and he appreciated Balanchine at that level. As he famously said in one interview, “What makes Balanchine so extraordinary is that when you see his dances, you feel ever after as if the steps were absolutely perfect for the music, and there can be no other choreography.” It was literally as if the music was becoming flesh before his very eyes. And it was that absolute clarity and concision and complete mastery of the medium that I think struck such a responsive chord with him. In the same way that Balanchine famously said, “Ballet is woman,” I daresay Gorey would say ballet is Balanchine.

Balanchine and Arthur Mitchell

(Balanchine with Farrell, McBride, Mimi, Paul, Verdy in promo for Jewels)
Photo by Martha Swope

(Photo via)

Arthur Mitchell passed away at 84.

Dancer broke barriers for African Americans in the 1950s in leading roles with the New York City Ballet

George Balanchine with Suzanne Farrell and Arthur Mitchell working on ‘Slaughter on Tenth Avenue’ in 1968.
Photo by Martha Swope from the collection of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
via

Balanchine archive

George Balanchine and Arhtur Mitchell

Mitchell shares interesting stories about Balanchine. (youtube) or why Pad de deux was so controversial (youtube)

Arthur Mitchell is an African-American dancer and choreographer who created a training school and the first African-American classical ballet company, Dance Theatre of Harlem.
In 1955 Mitchell made his debut as the first African American with the New York City Ballet
Mitchell was the only African-American dancer with the NY City Ballet until 1970. Choreographer and director of the NYCB George Balanchine created the pas de deux in Agon especially for Mitchell and the white ballerina Diana Adams. Although Mitchell danced this role with white partners throughout the world, he could not perform it on commercial television in the United States before 1965, because states in the South refused to carry it.

Arthur Mitchell

Slim dragon-fly
too rapid for the eye
to cage,

contagious gem of virtuosity
make visible, mentality.
Your jewels of mobility

reveal
and veil
a peacock-tail.

— by Marianne Moore

Arthur Michell Quote

A Life in Pictures.

Happy birthday Bob Fosse!

Paul Taylor’s Esplanade – Part 1/5
Part 2/5
Part 3/5
part 4/5

Happy birthday Paul Taylor! (biography)

Born on July 29, 1930, in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania, Paul Taylor started the Paul Taylor Dance Company in 1954 and worked with icons like Martha Graham and George Balanchine. Taylor went on to establish a massive repertory with his company and created a distinct, acclaimed mode of choreography in works like “Esplanade” and “Arden Court.”

Kiki Smith and Paul Taylor
(via)

The Paul Taylor Dance Company Performing Tracer, in 1962. Robert Rauschenberg’s Bicycle Wheel was the only scenery on stage.

Kindred Spirits (youtube)

(Dogs designed by Alex Kats)
Yerba buena SF 2015

“I had seen Paul dance for the first time shortly before we met with Edwin [Denby] and thought his choreography was one of the most surprising things I had seen as an artist. Paul’s dancing seemed to be a real break with that of the previous generation: no expression, no content, no form, as he said, and with great technique and intelligence.”

Alex Kats

Paul Taylor

Paul Taylor proves staying power of ’70s and ’80s dance

Pictured all smiles and full of joy the dance trio Gwen Verdon, Mikhail Baryshnikov & Rudolf Nureyev in performance benefitting the Paul Taylor Dance Company ..(via)

Trish Brown died (NY times)

wiki

5 artists speaking on Trisha Brown

Trisha Brown “Woman Walking Down a Ladder”

See Set and reset (8 min)
Set and reset (shorter version)
Set and Reset (1983)
Choreography: Trisha Brown
Music: Laurie Anderson, “Long Time No See”; Performed by Laurie Anderson and Richard Landry
Set Design: Robert Rauschenberg
Costumes: Robert Rauschenberg
Lighting: Beverly Emmons with Robert Rauschenberg

Robert Rauschenberg and Trisha Brown, 1983. Photo: © The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. Courtesy Art + Commerce

Documentary (Bach to Monteverdi)

Collaboration of the Century – Trisha Brown, Czesow Milosz and Laurie Anderson

Solo Olos (1976) (youtube)

See photos of Brad Dourif

Happy birthday Brad Dourif! (March 18)
Wise Blood, (J.Huston/Flannery O’Connor), One flew over the cukoo’s nest, Mississipi Burning, London Kills Me (Hanif Kureishi) . Tommy Lee Jones was supposed to play Hazel Motes. I just found this interview..

Many laughs of Brad Dourif (youtube)

In 1981, Vincent Canby listed Dourif as one of twelve actors to watch, calling Dourif “one of the most intense, most interesting young film actors of his generation”
(via wiki)

London Kills Me (Tumblr) (Written and directed by Hanif Kureishi)

Erik Bruhn and Nureyev Photo by Diane Arbus

Two supreme dancers directed by Ken Russell.

Nureyev’s birthday .. March 17, 1938 Nureyev was to die of AIDS – see more photos at Aids Memorial

Tatsumi Hijikata
Kamaitachi #40 (Hijikata Tatsumi), 1965 by Eikoh Hosoe
Tatsumi Hijikata His wiki shows a photo of Hijikata and Sada Abe (In the Realm of Senses by Nagisa Oshima was loosely based on Sada Abe)

Hijikata undertook his first Ankoku Butoh performance, Kinjiki, in 1959, using a novel by Yukio Mishima as the raw input material for an abrupt, sexually-inflected act of choreographic violence which stunned its audience. At around that time, Hijikata met three figures who would be crucial collaborators for his future work: Yukio Mishima, Eikoh Hosoe, and Donald Richie In 1962,

Yukio Mishima and Hijikata in Barakei – 1961 photographed by Eiko Hosoe.

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Title: Shinjuku Turmoil
Hijikata posed for Shomei Tomatsu 1970 (master photographer)

Keiya Ouchida, Hosotan, film de 1972. Chorégraphie de Tatsumi Hijikata.
Courtesy Cinémathèque de la danse © Collection Cinémathèque de la danse

Eiko Hosoe photographed Kauzo Ohno
Kazuo Ohno – previous post

Geoffrey Holder

Multitalented Artist, Dies at 84

Mr. Holder directed a dance troupe from his native Trinidad and Tobago, danced on Broadway and at the Metropolitan Opera and won Tony Awards in 1975 for direction of a musical and costume design for “The Wiz,” a rollicking, all-black version of “The Wizard of Oz.” His choreography was in the repertory of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and the Dance Theater of Harlem. He acted onstage and in films and was an accomplished painter, photographer and sculptor whose works have been shown in galleries and museums. He published a cookbook.

Geoffrey Holder and Carmen de Lavallade

Photo via

This lavish ballet choreographed, composed and designed by Geoffrey Holder depicts real and imagined events in the life of the renowned Haitian painter, Hector Hyppolite. The goddess Erzulie and St. John the Baptist appear to the central character in a vision, inspiring his vivid, exotic illustrations of the African gods and goddesses that populate Holder’s mystical theater and dance drama.

(image via)

B & B
(Martha Swope/George Balanchine Trust, via New York Public Library)
George Balanchine demonstrating a movement to a young Mikhail Baryshnikov at New York City Ballet.

Jerome Robbins, Edward Villella and Baryshnikov danced The Prodigal Son.

“Balanchine’s choreography upset Prokofiev, who conducted the premiere. The composer had envisioned a production that was ‘real’; his concept of the Siren, whom he saw as demure, differed radically from Balanchine’s. Prokofiev refused to pay Balanchine royalties for his choreography.”

Rouault and Prokofiev
Monte-Carlo, 1929

George Rouault – May 27, 1881

Fauvist and Expressionist
n 1907, Rouault commenced a series of paintings dedicated to courts, clowns and prostitutes. These paintings are interpreted as moral and social criticism. He became attracted to Spiritualism and the dramatic existentialism of the philosopher Jacques Maritain, who remained a close friend for the rest of his life. After that, he dedicated himself to religious subjects. Human nature was always the focus of his interest.

George Balanchine and Arhtur Mitchell

Mitchell shares interesting stories about Balanchine. (youtube) or whyPad de deux was so controversial (youtube)

Arthur Mitchell is an African-American dancer and choreographer who created a training school and the first African-American classical ballet company, Dance Theatre of Harlem.
In 1955 Mitchell made his debut as the first African American with the New York City Ballet
Mitchell was the only African-American dancer with the NY City Ballet until 1970. Choreographer and director of the NYCB George Balanchine created the pas de deux in Agon especially for Mitchell and the white ballerina Diana Adams. Although Mitchell danced this role with white partners throughout the world, he could not perform it on commercial television in the United States before 1965, because states in the South refused to carry it.

Arthur Mitchell

Slim dragon-fly
too rapid for the eye
to cage,

contagious gem of virtuosity
make visible, mentality.
Your jewels of mobility

reveal
and veil
a peacock-tail.

— by Marianne Moore

Other related links..
4 temperaments – Portraits of Paul Hindemith –

THe Unknown Balanchine.. (Balanchine’s early years)

George Balanchine was born on January 22 [O.S. January 9] 1904.

Virgil T
and Gertrude Stein (Photo via )

Four Saints in Three Acts Music by Virgil Thomson, original libretto by Gertrude Stein.

(Mark Morris – here and here )

Alice Neel
1971 Virgil Thomson
Oil on Canvas
48 x 37 inches / 121.9 x 94 cm
National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C.

Virgil Thomson (November 25, 1896 – September 30, 1989)

Virgil Thomson like many other great composers studied under Nadia Boulanger (scroll down)

More music by V.T.

Portraits (youtube)

Louisiana Story.. (Youtube)
Robert Flaherty – 1948