PAPER 7 MODERN DANCE AND ITS DEVELOPMENT IN THE WORLD AFTER 1960 (USA, EUROPE, SEA) MODERN EXPERIMENTS IN INDIAN CLASSICAL DANCE, NEW WAVE AFTER 1930, UDAYSHANKAR AND LATER CONTEMPORARY, CREATIVE ARTISTS MODULE 8 MODERN DANCE IN SOUTH AMERICA 1 (, ARGENTINA)

Latin dance is a common label for dances in South America. It refers to types of ballroom dances and folk dance that originated in Latin America. The category of Latin dances in the international dance sport competitions consists of the Cha-cha-cha, Rumba, Samba, Paso doble, and also the Jive of United States origin. Social Latin dances include Salsa, Mambo, Meringue, Tumba, Bachata, Bomba, Plena, and the Argentine Tango. There are many dances which were popular in the first part of the 20th century, but which are now of only historical interest. The Cubandanzón is a good example Perreo is a Puerto Rican dance associated with Reggaeton music with Jamaican and Caribbean influences. Latin folk dances of Argentina include the Chacarera, Gato, Escondido and Zamba. Typical Bolivian folk dances are the Morenada, Kullawada, Caporales and the recently created Tinku. In Colombia one of the typical dances is the Cumbia.

ARGENTINA

Cultural activities in Argentina are strong in Buenos Aires, one of the main Latin-American cultural capitals offering an energetic prospect for the performing arts. Many artists from all over the country migrate to the capital as prospects are centralized to this big cultural city. Yet, we can talk about some other existing dance centers in cities like Córdoba, Mendoza and Rosario. Some other new centers are also developing in cities like Neuquén, Bahía Blanca, Rafaela and Tucumán. There are hardly any perspectives for presenting international dance in Argentina. At the present time, the sole Performing Arts Festival which is renowned internationally is the Festival Internacional de Buenos Aires, which takes place every two years. Other chances to watch international dance pieces come through periodic co-productions at the Complejo Teatral de Buenos Aires.

The Festival Internacional de Video Danza is also of significance and is organized by Silvia Szperling, who has done a considerable work on the promotion of video dance in the country. Inside the country, we can point out festivals like El Cruce (Rosario), Nudanz (Rafaela) and Nuevas Tendencias (Mendoza). They are attractive festivals which could have larger international impact in the future provided they have more financial resources. In Córdoba the Festival Biannual Internacional de Teatro del Mercosur, is a festival with a high level international program which generally includes contemporary dance. Regular contemporary dance performances are generally hosted by El Camarín de las Musas and El Portón de Sánchez independently. Other dance arenas with contemporary dance presentations are the Centro Cultural Rojas, Centro Cultural de la Cooperación, Teatro del Sur, Centro Cultural Borges, Espacio Callejón, Espacio Ecléctico, Beckett Teatro, El Cubo and Centro Cultural Konex.

The young and upcoming artists are applying innovative practice sessions and self-management techniques with alternative contexts for performing and producing artistic exchanges. The Gabinete Coreográfico in Neuquén and Casa Dorrego in Buenos Aires are groups which have been working in partnership for years. They also organize meetings, seminars and the staging of creations. Many other groups like the Centro Cultural La Máscara de Rafaela organize dance festival and seminars.

No Se Llama organized in 2007 in Buenos Aires and in La Plata the Encuentro de Danza y Performance, El Arbol Danza Teatro organizes in Mendoza the Festival de Nuevas Tendencias, Cuatroicuarto in Bahía Blanca organizes performances and seminars, The Colectivo MXM in Córdoba and La Fabriquera in La Plata organize performances, seminars and courses, COBAI in Rosario is also putting up dance. The CoCoa–DATEI organized the first contemporary dance festival in Argentina in 1998. Nowadays they are working on various projects to present national and international dance programs, seminars, etc. Today in the city of Buenos Aires alone there are more than 100 contemporary dance companies. Yet, there are no proper professional companies and the many of argentine choreographers and dancers generally work concurrently with something else, like teaching or other types of jobs for earning their living.

PRODANZA, Instituto de fomento para la danza no official, established in 2001 with the objective of sustaining the cause of dance artists by contributing subsidies to help creative work. Another organization, the Fondo Cultura Buenos Aires, gives money to dance since 2004. But it is understandable that the subsidies, which fluctuate between a thousand and four thousand dollars, are not sufficient to produce professional dance pieces.

National scholarships up to three thousand dollars are given by Fondo Nacional de las Artes for producing dance pieces. Instituto Nacional de Teatro also offers scholarships and subsidies for dance- theatre. Support and scholarships are also given by the Departamento de Cooperación Internacional, which relies on the Secretaría de Cultura de la Nación. The Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores (Foreign Relations Ministry) often pay for international travel tickets.

Agencies like the British Council, Goethe Institute, Alliance Française and the Centro Cultural de España have accepted a range of projects associated to dance. The Servicio de Cooperación y Acción Cultural from the French Embassy (SCAC) is also an important associate.

In Argentina, since 1987, History, Theory and Modern Dance Aesthetics have been introduced in the arts faculty at the Facultad de Filosofía y Letras at the Universidad de Buenos Aires; and since 1992, there is the Programa Danza at the Instituto de Artes del Espectáculo initiated there. Important researches are being conducted here in the field. There are two universities where career opportunities for dancers and choreographers in contemporary dance are offered. One is the IUNA - Instituto Universitario Nacional de Arte, which has a contemporary dance company and the other is Universidad Nacional de Tucumán. There are some local schools where students and teachers are encouraged to take up dance, like the Taller del Teatro San Martín in Buenos Aires, the Escuela Experimental de Danza Contemporánea at Neuquén, the Escuela de Danzas de Bahía Blanca in La Plata and Morón in the Buenos Aires province; and the private school Arte XXI in Buenos Aires.

The initiation and development of modern dance in the country came with the North-American choreographer Miriam Winslow in 1941 and her choice to reside and create a dance company in Argentina. At the start of the sixties, the interest in modern dance had grown and there were many creators and groups who tried to work in new directions. One of them was the Instituto Di Tella, which invited the forefront artists of all fields to join. At the end of that decade the first official contemporary dance company in Argentina, the Ballet del Teatro San Martin was created.

Ana Itelman, the most significant choreographer of the country since the fifties and later choreographer (in the seventies and eighties) of the Grupo de Danza Contemporánea del Teatro San Martín was remarkable. In the seventies due to military authoritarianism, modern dance took a back seat and could not develop here.

In the eighties modern dance re-emerged through a festival called Danza Abierta, where many renowned and young artists expressed creativity but could not carry on due to political situation and till democracy was established in 1983. But we find in the eighties a number of argentine artists left Argentina to train in the new direction of dance that had not yet entered the country. The work of Cunningham, Nikolais, Release, Contact and the whole Judson Church movement in New York attracted them. But the artists like Graciela Concado, Teresa Duggan, Marina Giancaspro and some other stayed back and began working at the Margarita Bali School as teachers and were popular too. With the improvement of the economic condition through the nineties, the work for the dancers increased and many productions created. But again after 2001 the devalued currency in the country posed problem of continuation for contemporary dance exchanges. However, the political will of the city of Buenos Aires, sustained and enhanced the conditions in the cultural zone, not only initiating the Festival de Danza de Buenos Aires every two years, but also rising the budget for the Prodanza and forming a cultural fund for Buenos Aires.

Brazil: In Brazil dance has emerged from religion and folklore within the heart of the community. Cultural functions and Carnivals also had their roles to play.

We find Maria Olenewa was one of the first ballet teachers in Brazil. She and her company of dancers performed. Later with separation of school and company in the 40s Vaslav Velchek and Igor Schwezoff succeeded Olenewa as company director.

In the 1950’s the Teatro Municipal do became very popular. The director was Tatiana Leskova. She choreographed classics as Swan Lake, Giselle, and Aurora’s wedding. She was born in Paris in a Russian aristocrat family. She left Russia after the Bolshevik revolution. In 1942, she settled in Brazil, her home for the last 60 years. She was invited in the 90’s by Jacob’s Pillow and then the Joffrey Ballet to re-choreograph Massine’s ballet Choreatium. From this group of dancers emerged personalities like Márcia Haydeé, Ivone Meyer, Aldo Lotufo, Ady Addor, David Dupré, Maria Angélica, Dennis Gray and Nora Esteves.

In 1956 initiated the Ballet Association of Rio de Janeiro and worked for staging many classical pieces such as The Nutcracker, Romeo and Juliet, and Cinderella in addition to hosting guest appearances by international stars like Nureyev, Fernando Bujones, Natalia Makaraova, and Margot Fonteyn. A famous teacher, Achcar was also an advocate of equal opportunity. He headed social projects like Dança para Escolas, whose primary function was to support dance in the public schools and in high-risk districts.

In the 60s, teacher and choreographer Eugenia Feodorva influenced the succeeding generation of dancers. She was the one who choreographed South America’s first complete Swan Lake and was part of BTM’s (Bale do Teatro Municipal) notable line of directors, which includes Richard Cragun. Today’s director, Fauzi Nelson Paranhos, works with many distinguished personalities like Ana Botafogo, Aurea Hammerli(she’s worked with Bejart and American Ballet Theatre), Cecilia Kerche (a brilliant technical dancer and owner of a line of dance clothes sold throughout the country), and Nora Esteves to name a few. Their repertoire covers a lot of territory with examples like Nijinsky’s L’Après-Midi d’un Faune and The Rite of Spring as well as Deborah Colker’s Paixão (Passion) and Balanchine’s Serenade.

There is several official state schools in São Paulo, Belo Horizonte and , all associated with municipal theatres. The Bolshoi opened a ballet school in the northern part of the state of Santa Catarina in 2000. This is the first time in 227 years of Russian history that Moscow has permitted its teaching method to be applied in another country. Today the school offers an eight-year program specializing in the formation of young ballet artists.

In the 70’s era when a military dictatorship controlled the country, the organization Stagium in Sao Paulo, under the direction of Decio Otero and Marika Gidali, dealt with artistic censorship by bringing dance to slums, to prisons and the Xingu Indian tribes. This organization presented choreographies that had a distinct Brazilian identity. The corporal aspect was totally integrated with its indigenous roots and contains a social consciousness. Around the same when , Lucinda Childs, and David Gordon were doing new dimension in innovation in the U.S., Brazil had some very pioneering and strong willed artists. One of them, Graciela, who now resides in Uruguay, was an established artist in contemporary dance. She worked with the group Coringa, a group once described as “a band of bats following a wild mare.” Her group included artists like Ana Andrade and Michel Robim, and later Deborah Colker.

Coringa, which literally means joker, was open to all: fat, skinny, amateurs, professionals, tall and short everyone was encouraged to dance. This was an extraordinary idea. Another important thing was that Coringa was making an impression on the audience used to ballet performance.

In 1988, another significant group Quasar was established by Vera Bicalho and Henrique Rodovalho. Quasar has danced throughout Brazil and internationally for almost 20 years. ‘Quasar’s dancers seem to turn themselves inside out, upside down and move in such an inventive way that it shouts imagination and craftsmanship. Impulses in the body start in one place and jump to another part of the body and then suddenly explode, lifting the dancer airborne and sending him off in another direction.’ The company’s latest works, Coreografia para Ouvir (Choreography for Listening), Mulheres (Women), and Só tinha de ser com você (It had to be with you) are examples of reflections of the contemporary condition of Brazil.

The Centro Coreográfico (Choreographic Center) founded by the active artist Regina Miranda in Rio de Janeiro. This center was bestowed to contemporary dance and was open to all races and nationalities, has given many dancers the opportunity to work in exceptional conditions, like a fully equipped theatre. All these were sponsored by city funding via RIOARTE.

We notice in Rio three well known women with distinct choreographic approaches.

1. Deborah Colker’s choreography combines the movements from sports and the incorporation of everyday activities. A student of psychology, Deborah played volleyball and was also a concert pianist. She was with Coringa. Often called “Debinha,” she studies under Graciela Figueroa, and from her repertory we can understand Graciela’s deep influence.

2. Marcia Milhaze was trained in classical ballet. She is a Masters in Dance from the Laban Centre in London. After coming back to Brazil, she founded her company in 1994 and has gained strong national and international acclaim, receiving awards such as “Best Dance Performance in 2005” from the magazine Bravo, and the Petrobras Award in the Performing Arts for her choreography. Her work Tempo de Verão (Summer time) ranges between Brazil’s cultured and the trendy as its theme. The choreography is extremely noteworthy in gesture- Circular and spiral movements create a flexibility and create a physicality that brings to mind images of summer. 3. Lia Rodrigues’ works contain many vital themes; she tends to treat her theme satirically, possibly because of her association with Compagnie Maguy Marin in Paris. “In one work by Brazilian writer Mario Andrade, she explores corporally a universe of oral literature investigating possible rhythms suggested by the text and using Brazilian music from that time period. Or in another work she makes a statement against overpriced tickets by creating what she calls a “democratization of cultural access” in charging only 1.00 Real (about 40 cents) for admission. She then takes this theme and develops it in ways that allow us to see the body democratically.” Her current work, Formas Breves inspired from the book Six Memos for the Next Millennium by Italo Calvino, was highly praised at the International Modern Dance Festival in Montreal.

Other companies and individuals in street and jazz dance work not just for performances but they also prepared teaching methods. “People like William S. Caju, director of the Dança de Rua pela Vida; Rosali Rodrigues, director of the jazz company Raça, and Balé de Rua, Uberlândia, MG directed by Fernando Narduchi, Gathering dancers from all kinds of professions such as metal welders, gas station attendants, stone cutters and cooks. Supported through a cultural incentive financial program by the state of Minas Gerais, Narduchi guaranteed that these artists were able to leave their prior jobs and dedicate themselves exclusively to dance. For 13 years Balé de Rua continues to build bridges across turbulent waters by implanting valuable outreach training programs that give opportunities for youths in destitute neighborhoods.”

Today many Brazilian dancers work in major international companies. Leticia Oliveira is at Houston Ballet (see “25 to Watch,” January 2006); is first soloist at in London. and the Culberg Ballet have had several Brazilian dancers over the years as well as Martha Graham (Daniela Stassi, now back in Brazil), Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker’s Rosas, American Ballet Theatre and Joffrey.