The Origins of Modernism in Dance

THE ORIGINS Of RODERWISB IN DANCE

3, Lee Eisler

B.Ed,, University of British Colunbia, 1374

A THESIS SUBWITTED IN PABSIAL POLFILLHENT OP

TEiE EEQUIRE6EWT.5 PO2 THE CEGREE OF

PIASTERS OF SCIENCE (KINESIOLOGY) in the Department

of

Kinesioloq y

@ B. tee Eislsr 1980

SIWCN FWASER UNIVERSITY

April. 1981)

Rfl sights raserved, This work may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by phctocopy or othsr means, without permission of the author. Naxte: B. Lee ~isler

Deqree: Masters of Science (Kinesiolcqy)

Title of thesis: The Origins of Ho3ernisa In Dance

~uamininqcommittee: Chairperson: Eric Banister

Iris Garland senior Supervisor

Evan Alderson

r Margaret Savage

Santa Aloi External Examiner Assistant Professor Simon Fraser University

Date Approved: April 16, 1980 PARTIAL COPYRIGHT LICENSE

I hereby grant to Simon Fraser University the right to lend my thesis, project or extended essay (the title of which is shown below) to users of the Simon Fraser University L ibrary, and to make part ial or single copies only for such users or in response to a request from the library of any other university, or other educational institution, on its own behalf or for one of its users. I further agree that permission for multiple copying of this work for scholarly purposes may be granted by me or the Dean of Graduate Studies. It is understood that copying or publication of this work for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission.

Title of Thesis/Project/Extended Essay ------ABSTRACT Zoie Fuller, Isadora Duncan and Ruth St, Danis are well-known among dance historians as the *pioneers* of modern dance. With their novel dancs styles they offerad the first alternatives to both the classical ballet and the entertaining variety dance of the day. Bhat has not been clearly understood, however, is the unique social, cultural and artistic back- ground in sarfy twentieth century America which stimulated the concurrent 3evelopment of three inncvative dancer- choreographars, In this thesis I have examined the early stage careers of Fullex, Duncan and St, Denis to illustrate the connection between tha devalop~entof early mcdern dancs and the rise of populas culture in America, In an era that witnessed increassd industri3lizatim, urbanization and the possibilities of mass advertising, it was the new popular trends in literature, fashions, paintings, posters, social dance and staqe entertainment which influenced the osiqins of both image and atovement expressed in the early chcreoyraphic works of these dancers,

The study involved an historical exami~ationof the immediate cultural and social environment of these chcreoqraphers, A wide variety of books and magazines, early program notes and reviews were used to give an accurate picture ' cf their historical contsxt and to show thsir invcfvemsnt with the popular forms of entertainment at this time,

iii ,, In order to relate this historicdl material to ths choreoqrapky of these dancers it was necessary to focus on three of their early korks, fuflerss Ser~entine, Duncacls I~hiuonia12 ---Aulis, and St. Denis* Badha. Throuqh an analysis of the movement and imaqery in each of thsse dances it was possible to show the ways in which popular influencas had begun to lay the qrcundwork for an emerqing tradition of Hodernism in dancs, Characteristics such as the freeing of the torso, tha reduction of storyline and decor, and a new attention to aaovement itsslf as the primary focus of dance were elements that were lattr developed nore fully by chorsographers such as Hartha Graham, Doris Bvinphr sy, and Herce Cunningham, ..LIST ....PLATES Plate Page 1 . mie Fulisr...... 62 2 . J.C. Leyendecker. The Century. 3836 ...... 62 3 . ~ouisahead. The Century. 18 96 ...... 63 4 J.C. Layendecker. The fntssior. 1838...... 63 5 . ~oieFuller. Serpentin2...... e. 63 0 6 . The Cigarette Poster Which Inspfrad Ruth St . Denis) Career as a Dancer...... 64 7 . Ruth St. Densis . A Costume Inspired By The Chgaretta

8 . Ruth St. eni is. Radha. 1306...... $.65. 9 . Unknown. 1899...... *..65 10 . J.C. Leyendscker. The Inland Printfr. 1837 ...... 65 11 . Euth St. eni is. Radha. 1906...... 65 32. Hill Low. Scsibnerv sf 18 95...... 56 13 . Isadora Duncan. New York city. 1898 ...... *.*...... 66 14 . Theatre Advertisement. Sari FranciscoJ 9882 ...... 67 15 . Isadora Duncan ...... 67 16 . Unknown. 187? ...... 67 97. United States Lottery Advertisement. 1820 ...... 67 ACKNOWLEDGEBENTS --U__I__----- special thanks to Evan Alderson, Iris ~aflandand Nelson

Gray for their continued help in focusing and editinq my research on modern dance and popular culture, CHAPTER THC popular Culture in ~~srica...... 11

CHAPTEB THREE The Vaudeville Influence ...... e~De~~s~~Dt~~#~DD~e~~~ CHAPTER FOUR The Physical Culture Hovement and Applied aesthetics ~f Delsarte in Amarica...... 38

CRhPTER FIVE Popular and Com~9rcialImagery...... 53

CHAPTER SIX Epi~og~~...... ~....~.~...... ,.....~....68 Appendix I:.,.,...... b..~~m~aee~~~~~~DDD~~mi.~e~~~e~a~~~~~~D78 ....usr LP PLBTES Plate Page

LQ~@PU~~@~***S*.~CI***SJ~~~*~~*~*~*~*~D~~~~S~*~~*~*S**~~ 3.C. Leyendecker. The Century. 1896...... 62 Louis Rhead. The Century. 1896 ...... 63 J.C. Le yendecker. The Interior. 1898...... 63 Loie Puller. serpentine ...... *63 The Cigarette Postzr Which Inspired Ruth St. Denis'

Career as a Dancer ...... as...... *64 Buth St. Denis . A Costwe Inspired By The Cigarette Post~r...~...... S...... 64 Ruth St . Penis. Radha. 1306 ...... 65 Unknown. 1839...... a.S.....65 J.C. Lsysnde,c&ar. The Inland Printsr. 3897 ...... 55 Ruth St. Denis. Radha. 1306...... *65 gill Lou. Scribaer's. 1895...... * ...... 66 Isadora Duncan. New York City. 1898...... 66 Theatre Advertiseaent. San Francisco. 1882 ...... 67 Psadara Duncaa ...... *..*67 Unknown. 3R7?...... *..57 United States Lottery Wdvertisemmt. 1820...... 67

vii CHRPTER ONE

Introduction

At the turn of the twentieth century, American painters and wrft~rsopposed to the prevalent sentimentality and idealization in art were aovinq towards fiealism and Naturalism. Durinq this same ti~nte three young women, Loie fuller, Isadora Duncan and Ruth

St, Dsnis, began to attract public attention with theif nzo- romantic aesthetic and interprativ~dance. Performing barefoot U-' and Hn loosely draped often revealinq costumes, they qathered audiences as varied as vaudeville regulars, elite artists, society ladies intrigued by novelty and voyeurs in search of a i*nl;l-2-tusnad~t lag, aith a return to the spirit of nature as a basis for movement, these dancers, unlike artists such as Stephen

Crane, Edith Uharton, Oilliam Doan Howells and The Eight Group, $ igccred the grcwing industriali n of socisty and exalted a .I // :( 1'" -, romantic spirit. Uacorseted, st que and vibrant, Loie Fuller,

Isadora Duncan and Ruth St, Denis reflected ths imaqe of the new

Aaerican woman in pursuit of fresh air, exercisa and the arts. The influence of these three noa+n on the development of modernism in dance was revolutionary and far-rsaching, aith their novel dance styles they offered the first alternatives to both the classical ballet and the antertainiaq variety dance of ' the day, ghat has not bee& clearly understood, however, is the

1 unique social, cultural and artistic background in early

twentieth century America which stimulated the concurrent develcpment of three innovativt dancer-choreographers, Any dance

historian who attempts to trace the influences which fashioned

the dance styles of Fuller, Duncaln and St. Dsnis will find that it is a difficult task to fallow their progression from dancers 6, - i )/I 9) ,+ nc in a corps, to vaudeville soloists, to artists acclaimed across Europe. until recently dance history has tended towards bioqraphical tfsatmonts of these modern dance pioneers and

N , larqefy iqnored the artistic and cultural context of their work, 5 " (' n,' ,, This method of historical. repostinq has often led to fragmented P,,) : I I,, acceunts which tend to 3uloqize the dancers rather than document y<\a c' i' th6 devalopment of the naw danca form. Stataaents such as ths I cF folfowinq, while full of anthusiasm for Duncan's i tY9 c ciasm do I\ ulO"littleto provide a context for her artistic innovations:

What Beethoven is to raodern music, what Walt Whitaan is to poetry, Lsadora Duncan is to modern dance--the first great rosanticist, the first apostle of freedom and de~ocracyin her aft, the liberator conventions. f

fn addition, the early modern dancers, in their autobiograghiss, y4 often present even ~0r3outrageous accounts than their

historians. Isadora Duncan, for example, proclaimed that she

first beqan to dance in her mother's womb **a result of the < t': oysfers and chamgiagae, .. the food of ~phmdite, /i 4 Few historians havf; thoroughly inveszlgated the intricate network of social, cultural and artistic patterns that influenced these dancers, An exception, Olga Haynard, attetnpts to place *#the dance within its eras, parallel with other trends in society and the arts.g*3 Though not always carefully documented, tha work of this author is nevertheless more inforaative than Halter Terry" sisleading assert ion that Miss

Ruth, nnith no precedents in formulatinq a new dance, with nothing to copy, with hardly a clue, revealed a new world of dance,..unaided,tr* iiithout a more comprehensive study of the interrelationships involved in the development of the personal dance style of each of thss~ndancers, an understanding of "che rocts of ~odesnis~in dance is extremsly limited,

The raatter of lnodsrrnity irk dance was a puzzlenent zo John martin, and it was he who first raised ny interest in pursuinq its coaplex oriqins,

It is by contagion rather than logic that the word 'modern* has got itself attached to the particular typa of dance which has come to life as a characteristic American expression, The modern novsntent: in general, embracinq music and painting and literature, was enjoying the full flush of its Lriuraph over middle class sasugnoss before the rsvival. of interest in the dance as a cfsative ~ediuahad gathered force enough to be noticed. The comparative unirnpostancs of this particular art in the public mind has been of inestimable value to its development, for if it has been forced to blush tlnsee~~,,,it has also been alloued to grow unmolested, When it finally grew into a certain maturity and came inevitably into general vision it found itself somehow , automatically associated with those other insurgancies which had precededy it in popular notice.5 Martin suggests here that the new American dance form did not develop through a systematic association with ths other continental aodern art movements, and expresses surprise that modernism in dance found itsslf #'somehow autoaaticaflg associatedfl with these other art forms, while failinq to explore these suggestions of a unique modernist history in dance, Bartin does raise several important questioos which servs to focus this discussion concerning the roots of modernism in dance. First, if modern dance arose

what were t ces which contributed to - and dlistinguished its growth? Second, why was its developmsnt -- - " - such a poorly docuaented historical event? And finally, what ware the primary sleaents in the works of PuPler, Duncan and St, Denis which began to define the notion of modernism in dance?

In attempting to answer thase questions we can begin to see an astonishing connection between the developnant of early - -- - - . - rise fn aodern -danc2 and the sf popular culture in hmerica, an .- "" - - " ? era that witnessed -incrsased ------industrialization, - . .- urbanization and the possibilities of mass advertising, it was the new popular - trends in literature, fashions, paintings, postars, social dance and stage entertainraent which influenced the origins of both imaqe and movement expressed in the early dances of Fuller,

Duncan and St. Denis, In a discussion of these influences cn modern dance we need I: not rely solely on impressions gleaned from the numerous biographies and autobioqraphies of these woiaen, TQ observe and obtain evidence from ths dance, rather than the dancar, f have chosen to examine three well-known choreographed works from each artists* early pears; dances which were popular wfth audiences and therefore fonq-lived in thsis respective sepertoirss,

Films of Loie Fuller's Sefpentige, Ruth St, Denis1 Wha and Iaadora Duncan8s Iphiqenia Bulis provsd indispensable in forming the qroundwork of this study, In the case of Duncan, who never allowed herself to be filmed, I have use4 a reconstruction performed by Hortsnse Kooluris, a well-known daccsr in the

Dnncan style, Reviews, scrapbooks and newspaper clippings, old proqrams, intervisk's aad photoqrctpha furnished further information reqardiny particulars such as audience response, concert proqraaming, stags setting and costumes.

The dance analyses, presented in Appendix I, are simply constructed to make the dances accassible to the layperson and the movement specialist. The observations of each film were made with a special handviewer in order to break down the dance frame by fra~e,as well as with tht usual automated film projectos tc add an accurate sense of timing, and musicality. Each analysis is divided into three sectioos, Column A presents the verbal dance reconstruction while Colu~ns0 and C select and identify specific components of each dance which will be further examieed in Chapters 3, 4 and 5, These analyses will examine the use of imagery and characteristic aovelitent in the dances of the early pioneers,

Movement may ks defined as the process of changing the place or

position of the body, bath postural a3d gestural, while image refers to a reprssentational sbaps occurrinq in an inszant of

time. As both movement and image interrelate in each compositf onal work, these two cateqories form the headings

of Columns B and C respectively, indicating the distinctive details which characterize a specific dance, *

I The seccnd stage in this study concerning the roots of modernism in dance involves an historical examination of the

i~mediatecultural and social environment of the three

dancer-chorsographers. A wide variety of books and magazines

were used ic the search for priwe factoss which influenced the

stylistic motifs dictated in Columns 3 and C of the dance

analyses {Appendix I). These sources include literature detailfnq Rlaerican iuterest and development (1850-1910) in

vaudeville and theatre, mass printing and lizhcgraphy, fashion

and advertising, as well as specific trends in mysticism

and the Oslsnt, cultural-health, social dance and the

.d ilfaericaanized Ddsarte movement, I have emphasized urban rather

than rural conditions because in this period the city was the , ------* (see Appendix I) The following discussion uilf draw from Bppendix I and continual references to it wiil be made throughout this thesis. focus of the newly emerqent mass culf,ur%, N@M York is

particularly important, as it: is hiere that Fuller, Duncan and st. eni is cam to promcte their stage caresrs, leaving their respective birthplaces of Fullersbtirg, 1 f linois, Oakland,

california and Newark, New Jersey, Recent biographical articles by several dance scholars tend

to support the view that popular culture was a significant ------infhence on the works of these dancer-choreographers, Suzanne I I ~Shelton,writing on the early career cf Buth Sc. Denis, affirms

'that "the physical culture movement in America, the variety staqe and popular spectacles provided the climate in which Ruth

St, Denis* art was bora.rr6 fn her discussion Shalton illustrates that the American advocates of francois Delsarte's theories of

expsession,* including Gensviev~Stebbins an3 Steele HcKaye,

arastically altered the Delsartian philosophy as it was taught in Europe, The "Delsartian qospelN in Anerica is described as a

practical approach, rhich overlapped with the self-help novernants and opened the way for expansion into $*health and hygiene, exercise, and gymnastics, statue posing and dress

ref orn. "T

Other vogues such as the growing interest in Oriental aysticism at tho turn cf the csntury are mentioned by Christina

Schlundt as probable keys to understandinq "the St, Denis

--I------* gcr detailed discussion concernirq ~fancoisDelsarte * s theories of dramatic expression see Chapter 4, experience." Schlundt frequsntly quotes from Hal Bskdqes who, in his discussion of Vedanta and Zen Buddhism during the ~aerican

18908s, points out the grovinq numbers of "the near mystical and the pseudo mystical, the lnifiators and foilowsrs of the popular enthusiasm and fads,,,**B Nesta Macdor~ald, in discussinq soias of the lesser known aspects of Duncan's lzfe, explains how she

played bit parts in a variaty of Augustin Daly productions,

sinqing and dancing her way through The Geisha, M8q Herrilezs, Bidsummer Nigbtss Dseam and & Like Even more I-- You C_------f2, significant was Duncan *s encounter and resulting infatuation

with the music of Ethelbert Nevin which according to nacdonald was *"ugh to ths popular taste of the time.'JQ Sally Scmrner directly draws on Fuf lerts early a•’filiations with ths popular atage as a kind of aesthetic foundakion upon

which Fuller would bass figs own theatrical concepts, Pantoaaime-spectacles vhich relied on sensational iraaqesJgao

modulated by spectacular lighting effects, are proposed by Soaaer as influential factors in Fuller's artistic development. Such plays incorposated a variety format, in which actes de ballet, sonqs and dance were coabined with startling scenic transforaaations.* It is to ~oieFuller's background in such farms of mass ectertainment that Sonmer encourages us to look; a World where panoramas, phantasmagorias and magic laatern shows ------* 1h 1887, Alfred Thcmpsonis exotic spectacle, Alladin, featured Loie Fuller backed by the Imperial Burlesque CoEpany* were popular, and stage ~roductionsemphasized the marvsls af scenic tracsfosaaticns through the deveiopinq era ft of lights and qauze pro jgcted onto changing objects and forms, Dance scholars such as Suzanne Sh~lton,Christina Schlundt, Nesta Hacdonald and Sally Sommss are apparsntly aware of mrtain influences which ~opularculture had on these individual daxcers, It is in these biographical studies that we learn of the young Isadcra who met Rugustin Daly while dancing in a beer garden or Ruth St. Denis who mad2 her solo debut in the vaudevillean Hudson Thoatre. Howaver in order to more fully exmine the effects of papular culture on the oriqins of modern dance it will. be necessary to focus on not one, but all thr~eof the acclaimed modern dance pioneers. We need, in effect, to retrac2 the paths of Loie Fuliar, isaiiora Duncan and Ruth St. Denis who, working individually and at diff~renttiaes during the two prdiuo decades, (1890- 1910) , initially performed on the popular stages of eithsr chicago or New York and later refined their dance styles in England, France, Germany and other foreign countries. Although references may be made to their continsntaf years, it is ~rimarifythe Eoroeatilre years in ~maricawhich will be the emphasis of this paper, Ad~ittediy,their latter experiences are easier to trace as qrowiny involvements with cther artists resulted in considerable docurnsatation ie th.3 forin of .poems, paintings, graphics and sculptures ccncernlng the dancers, yet, it is their early stage devalopmsnt tracaakls in odd magazines or books on vaudevilla or health culture, as well as early program noteE and reviews that reseals the primo influencing factors and process of consolidation iovol ved in the creation of an fiindividuai" dance style. CHAPTER TVO

Popular Cul%use in America Popular culture, the business of amusing and entertaining

the great body cf coagcn people, emerged after the American - - civil War.* Between the yeass 3820 and 1890* Awerica's ,+" -- - -" - fvb~n rapidly growing economy, marked by increased industrialization, ;.2" > transportation and migration, had drasticaUy altsred the urban

environment, In the Northeastern united Statds population in ths

\',lkp cities rose from 567,000 to W,867,OOO. 1 By 1890, fifty-eiqbt P,*+' (b $QY percent of the population in Northeastern America and sixty-fivs percent in New york state was located in the cities,

This new urban society had much more leisure time and much "4 ------I

elite, The roots of popular culture, according to Alfred McLean,

Js,, "lay desp in the experience of raillions who had swarmed into the American cities., ,who sought imaqes, yestures and

symbols which would objectify their expesisnce and bring to

their lives a simple and comprehensive meaning, Another ------* Actually, the first popular theatre, Hew Bowery opened in New York on the eve of the civil war, However, it is not until after the war that the proliferation of theatres begins,

* The period 3820-1830, according to Ann Douglas in Qg ~'einizatiw Lf American Culture, marks the initia 1 ccmmercializat~oaof American culture, most notably the revolution in printing, the use 'of nationally circulated rtwspapess and magazines and :he Popularizatdcn cf the stags, writer, Russell Lynes, explains that "when Andraw Jackson was ($ 5, elected to the presidency in 1828 on a vaye of cocksure

~rnericanismthere caae with him not only a new caqs of the

common mani but the bsginninqs of w5at f would like to call th.2

Aqe of the public Taste. Taste became everybodyrs business and not just the business of a cultured few."J L,~~i,\ [: ,9j , ",. G':,~? From the ti~eof early settlement ~merica'sideolaqical ,05 b,b <",P tradition was characterized by diversity sather than

homgeneity, Robert Toll suggests that these beginnings of mass e

who envisioned a cultural renaissance in which ~mericanartists

uoufd hzing Eufopsan forms to new heights, and the? Lmiddlinq3 -- --- " -" d Aaerican who sought native forms, symbols, and institutions to ct$9'8~~k L-- --- ."-.--. $- ,A

" c\\ $9 J -ent ctinq demands of both groups. Afmost inevitably entertainment in i - -_ ------Anrerica fraqratnsmed into "hiqhbrow*q and "lowbrowtq--efitist and a. , popular. Out of the turmoil. cams unequ~vocallypopular forms

1 p jiP"~.> that were both - and the way products- -.responses to- -- common Ainarica transformed old cultural institutions. *** P- - Documentation of this newly davaloping industry of popular culture is difficult. The forces which propelled it u, are as

t nu~erousand widespread as its audiences, Much of its early , L - growth took place in unnoticed, backroad localities including .;, ce i saloons, taverns, beer qardens and numarow small grasses. Husic halls, free and sasies, concert saloons, provided an opportunity to drink in the garish atmosphere crealqd by music, scantily dressed glrl waitr~sses,and beautiful entertainers, Chicaqo, which liksd to call itself the Paris of America, had scores of these places, but New York really held unchallenged leadership, In 1898, the police of Gotham listed ninety-nine a~usemsnt rssosts, including s&mns with music and entertainment on the Bowery alone.5

or entertaintttent values."a It covers a vast number of activities L - - -- -" - - Ero~the daily newspaper to certain architectural trends, from

the Chautauquan lecture platform to touring theatre and variety B':. B':. ;/ , troupes. A pertnllent charact5ristic pointed out by historians

Robert 3, Roberts, Carl Bode and Lr;o LowenThai is its

derivativa nature; its "repetition of given facts with the use

of borrowed tools. It? Vaudeville at one the or another brought just about every

form of entertainment under its umbrella, even brief qlimpses of nante stars from the legitimate stage. Working on the vaudeville stage afforded a wide variety of influences includinq borrowed

acts frog across the Atlantic. Sarah Berehardt creat~da

sensation in 1895 when she appeared on She stage of the Providence Theatre in short scvnes iron La Tosca and Clecpatra,

Ruth St, Denis, in her autobiography ~nfinishedLife, tecalls

being influenced by Bernhardtts ~~picturesgueposingstt in an old melodra~aficproduction of 32Soscersr, in New York.8 Conskantly searching for ways to divsrsify the standard

t" acts, #*agents were quickly dispatched to ~uropeto locate new ,J- (,4 ' 7," LG attractions for American palates. As a result of one of these

expeditions the Skirt Dance was importsd from London Music - .- . - -

Halls.'tQ--- - In a similar fashion, Nautch and Danse du Ventre wers introduced to the American public from the Far East. 30th of these acts, incorporated into the variety shou format, @ere to

have a great effect oa the dances of Loie Puller and Ruth St.

It is difficult to comprehend popular arts' wide sphere of

influencz durinq the nineteenth century, partlcuf arly the later decades, without a closer look at the growth rate and increased r > (..I L 3 ril marketability of these indus triss. flagazine and hook printinq, 1 - - 15 [F8)1 W /o/~.,-r~l,r,8

pesforminq- and -. ------" I ~1~: - -- - -non-performinq popuf ar arts which inf fuenced rr

By the late nineteenth century continual advances in / printing technology IB the cheap production of books, ------periodicals and posters which were diss&minated to a qrowing d ------. . 3:n the magazine industry the numbef ,-. of publications increased fros, 700 in 1865 to 3,300 in 1885, and

narratives with a sprinkling sf poetry, anecdote, curiosa and ------fashions swamped the market with journals such as 3arperss --Bazaar (1867), I"fcCa1le s (formerly g! Queer,, 1875) , Farm Journal (9800), and Ladies* Home Journal [1883),

Wassive amounts of popular iitsrature, inclvdinq pirated editions of English authors, were printad as the annual output of books in America doubled by 1830, and again tripled by

1300.11 Frank Luther Hott, author of Golden Multitudes2 %3. -St= of Best Sellers & Aaerica denotes the literature of the sixties and seventies as "fiction of sentiment" later leading

into the popular "high romancew* vhich constituted "half the

top best sellers 65 the year, [1894-19023.j*12 , Beadle, and other dike novels--cheap paper books generally

known for their low-level fiction--also flourished at this tizue.

Pubfishars such as Bonneliy, Lloyd F Coaparsy who started with semi-monthly quartos were quickly surpassed by others, including

Georqe Munro of the seaside Library series who began daily

publication of such books,

The GroPier Club In New York, as part of an exhibitfun af -One Hundred _apd fifty Influential Books Printad before 5292, listed the ten a~ostpopular books as:

3. meska, Indian Wife white Hunker, Anna Sophia Stephens. 2, The first of the 5gadle Dime Novels. ------3, Snow Bound, John Greenleaf Whittier, * The year 1094 saw the publication of a new ~~~cessionof romantics: 1. Prisoner Zendq, Anthony Hope; 2, Under t& &@' &kg, Stanfey J. Weynnn; 3, Joha Rarch Southerner, Georqe W, Cable; 4, WafninqV_sTeri.1, Captain Charles King, df Ol 3 rn 'dl 2 G 4 nl at: a "$2 .d i U "i 2 entertainment the audience attsndance increased sharply 9 -- 9" YOIU~and children as well as the usual male spectator. 'f$~${,.; - . ------. - -.--A . -. -

o,od term 0 vaudeville (a first coined in 1881) took cver -the acts "R ' performed in s-iloons and bees: qardens and cleaned thsm up. By

the mid 18809s vaudwille was easily the most popular form of theatrical entertaf nment, d di determined by the size of vaudeville theatres, t

j, --urban . population attended- vaudeviffe--- . once a wesk, 15 In addition, -. 1 !large vaudeville houses with capacities of 12,000-20,000 and incomes decades 0 :gross of 320,000 per week proliferated in the ill ? :{i%i* $cb /follouinq 1890. During this time New York City sported a qrouth ti Y I I ,front seven tc thirty-one variety theatres while Chicago added 4 sixteen to their +*vaudeq*listinqs. A colaparative survey

:sponsored by the Russell Sage foundation illustrates the firm

I base vaudeville held in Bmrican culture, with weakly receipts i I totalling $315,000 from low-priced variety shcvs topping the It YS@~ r-bira\ $190,000 income of high priced theatresat* $3 In addition to the popularization of art forms such as '& theatre and literature, there arose in Amarica a widespread d@ - - - - - int~restin health and physical culture, an interest which found ------\ J1 ,, ,, %la Chautuaqua grew wen larger than th-2 earlier Lyceum self

impsovment system which, by 1850, was supporting three thousand

Summer session programs which started on the shores of Laka Chautauqua, New York, offered studies in inusic, dramatic interpretatioa, lecture, oratory, stereopticon views and physical culture. Tent or circuit Chautauquas wers well

established by 3900, and thirtyone states boasted their own pavilions or parhaps a half a dozen of tham.17 This latter trend , &(& \bbi vb , bc@g towards expansiac can bo described as the conmercialization and pQ*, , standardization of Chautauqua for the purpose of taking it on \oP8~ % 4&,l , the road. This development led to sotpe degradation of its - - '! dl'" content since- pure entertainment attractions qradually

;ST&- .,' ,Ci (,,? $ lb't Hhat originally started as a program of Sunday School l)-r f" p-) pk' pedagogy in 1866 evolved into a sravellfng circuit which offered XLQ " 9 c popular education courses with a particular emphasis an

so-called mcralture, '8 Sousa8s marches and Stephen FOS~S~rfs songs

Yere played between orchestrations of Bach, iiaodel, Rsndelssohn

or Hagner. Bird uhistI.ers, bell ringers, and singers who drew

cartoons shared the stags with plays as diverse as Ha~let,

,Hadame i3utZc?sf1y, !i%~flikado, Peter Fan, Robifl Hood or the popular melodrama Turn 22 ,tt fight. Therefore, it is nct unusual that the Chautauquan tradition, an intermix of *high and lor-brow8 art, raadily inccrporated intc its currlcul9m of events the physical cultur? and health Bovsmeat, with its Americanized, popularized version of I)elsarte*s philosophy of expression, githin this Chautauqua circuit the Amsrfcan Applied Aesthetics of Delsarte ftspread like wifdfirs across the ~ontinent,~~~*moving outwards from its orfginal base in New York whera the major esrponmts Steels

MacKay and Genevieve s tebbins actively lectured, tauqh t azad per formed. It is difficult to know hou many Americans flokked to the tent Chautauquas and campad on the grounds next to the pavilion,

But according to Victoria and Robert Case's study of the physical culture at least '*twenty million livfns- Americans ,b .' 1: remembsr Chautauqua mostly with nostalgic vividd~s.~"~ in discussing these three aspects cf popular culture in

America f have negefected to mantion the enormous expansion I /, ' , invclved fn industries such as lithography, fashion acd advertisinq, Indeed it would require several books to detail the

9, 9, / rise and growth of each of these movements in Aaerica. sufiice 5 it to say, that in the late nineteenth century various fcrns of culture were made readily available to the large masses of middle class A~ericans. This rapidly expanding mass market ------~ - -- brought n i --- - a nd shquld come as no surpris~then, in a country with no established tradition in dance, that its first inuovativa dancers would sinergs from and reflect the forms and conditions of this popular culture. CHAPTER THREE The Vaudeville Influence

Born into an era when "variety fevart4 was reaching its height, fuller, Duncan and St, Denis in their zarly careers resembled the new type of star who dazzled and charmed audiences with a minimum of traditional professional- trainFng- - and a maximum of raw energy and vitality. Womm Leadliners such as Eva ------Tanquay, Nora Bayss, Gertrude Hoffman, Elsie James, Bessie Clayton and Lillian Russell advertised their personalities in high-spiritsd acts of sonq and dance,

Single Bomen! The ~ostdazzling act on any bill uas the Single w cmac, the prsonality-plus gal,, ,Sha appsared to upbeat music and kept the mood of her act that way, rendexing ballads, ragtime and at late evening shows an occasional risque song--all interspersed with briqht patter.

A isla jor influence in this popularization of the dancing girl and the display of .legs was the 1866 production of 'he

--Black -,,,ICrook a spectacle of inusic an3 ballet woven t~getherin a thin malodramatic plot, European ballerinas Marie Bonf an ti and

Rita sanqallf were inported to dance the solo roles before an

Awrican public oaly vaguqly familiar with this continental art,

It was a success, In fact, the show ran almost continuously for thi.rty years, picking up countless hmerican girls and has-tily traininq them fc= the corps de ballet. Spectacles featuring dancz, in ths tradition of J!! Black

Crook, continued through the eighties and nineties with the multitude of KiraPf y Brothers productions: Hickory Dickory Dack, enough, vaud~villeshows benefited from the popularity of shesa spkctacles since dancing girls, includinq loie Puller, Isadora

Duncan and Ruth St, Denis, frequently stepped out of the corps de a ballet to take solo spots in variety acts, Vaudeville,------as a result, its with .- soft-shoe and kallet became a unique spawning ground for neu and " -

Ruth St. Cenis, in her autobiography, recalls these early ***-. vaudeville days:

I danced to a piec~called 'Gavotte dsAmour'. However, to me it was not a gavotte of love, but ~f backbends and cartwheals which 1 intersperssd with aany flourish?s-. ..a &ad Isado-ra Cuncan reccllscts dancing to a popular piece called -- -The --Washinqt~n Past, a musical score renowned for the frolicking social two-step of the saw name.*

The itlusic started up and f did my bes% to give that manaqer a peppery dance, inprovising as I wmt, He was simply delighted, took the cigar out of his mouth and said, '"Thatls fine! You can come on togiarLrw night and f 'll hava a special. anncuncement, 3

* qccordinq to Philip Richardson, in gh Social Dances of she ------Nineteenth --Century, the two stsp "was danced averywhere for one season in 3094." During this era, vaurlaville entertainers faatured short

novelty acts with distinct audience appeal, fn dance the saxy allure of the costumes was often enough to spark audience

interest, Joe Laurie, Jr., a vaudeville star and variety columnis*, describes Loie Fuf ler8s first appearance as a sole \ ------dancer:

Bfter about three fears of seeing madium and ankle lenjth costumes, the custoaers got to longing for a peep at the undraped figure, so when Loie Fuller dressad in a full length transparent skirt, came into th? spotlight with her Serpentis2 dance, Miss Fuller and the dance jumped into favour,*

Isadora Duncan and Ruth St, Denis continued this dariaq display -- --

adapted for their respective stage personae. The Globe and ------."-----.-" - "- -- Com~erciaf Advertiser in 1306 announced the attraction of _A LC~

'0~'- gild stories of their shocking suggsstiveuess coupled >lr,I with societyrs O,K, drew a great crowd of cvrzous folk yesterday to see the East Indian dances of Ruth St, Denis, Every seat in the gallery, balcony, and pit was occupied, scores stood in the aisles ~ndlobby, and scores went away because nothing but standing room was for sale, All of which goes to show what a powerful box off ice is Came Rumour,s

A continual search for diversification and spectacle was in itself, a trademark of vaudeville. Neu acts and combinations

QS acts were continually being evolved or borroved, in order to .$ .< please audiences whc had an insatiable desire for novelty. Yhen

Ruth St. Denis performed Radha and other Hindu dances in 1.306, the New York Times announced: '\ Society has discovered somathing nsu under the limeliqht, Out of the jaws of vaudeville a group of New York uoaien who still keap a weary eye out far up-to-date novelties, have snatched a turn which they hope to make more or less of an artistic sensation, A set of Hi~du dances performed by a New Jersey girl with a rather convinciagly clear notion of what she is doing constitutes this find. 5

these variety shows presented a larae nuaber of entertainmsnt

acts- -in-- rapid succession, Thus, each act featured only ,a slttall qroup of performers and was also relatively short in duration, L-__- -- - The ~arlymcdsrn dancers mmained solsists during their careers and developed a short, lyric dance form in their later works, In effect, a new format for dancs concarts was established, Unlike the evening length ballets which evolved

around a sinqle thome, the modern dancs concerts consisted ------" of several shortsr dances of variant themes. Sureiy the &- - - -" . - " - . --- - eclecticism of these variety shows would account for the diversity of styles and themes ubich emerqed in the work of

these three dancers, This will become Bore clear as we examine some of the details of their early chareoqraphy.

ik Probably one of the most raauily noticeabls characteristics \{

Duncan, is tk incorporation of wel 1- known social dance steps -'-" ll...^^ " ------?-

24 Irma Duncan has structured twelve exercises to ------basis of dance, which evolved -I_I.-.-- -" ---..------. - I Lessons ten and eleven, 9!h~faltz" and "The PolkaJs, sre desiqnated dance steps "par excellence, as a basis for move~ent with arms, head and body."?

"Make a waltz step forward with the right foot. Turn to the riqht and step backward with the left foot, As you tura, raise the tight arm in a curve over your head, Turn again to the sight with a waltz step on zhe riqht foot, as you hold the right arm forwards, etcetqB

As seen in Appendix I, 1phiqenia & Au1.i~sxetaplifies the use of the waltz step as a transitional ele~entwhich reappears six times throughout this dance. The Skirt Dance has often been described as a compromise - ---" - - --- social dance form is the source of the famcus vedddle step,' a small vertical step which causes ths body to bob up arid down with a transfgr of weight. Such a step is readily apparent in

Fuller's ssrwntine and St. Denis* Radbp, sections 11 and VI sespectivelg, A nsvspaper clipping, written Warch 23, 1830, in America, documents -the distinctive characteristics of ZPe _Real --Skirt ----Dance: No eccentricity of the arsatic fancy of theatre qoers who find amuseaent in the lighter forms of theatrical entertainment is quite. so marked as the rage of Sha hour for that curious form of feminine pedal gymnastics which has become known as the 'Gaiety Skirt Dancey whose chief characteristics are its bevildering methods of bifurcated skirt-s winging and its spectacular excess of kiqh-kicking, The oriyinal srirt dance gas introduced in this city when th& Gaiety Thsatra Co., ,.made its debut about a year and a half ago at this Standard Theatre, and brought forward &iss Sylvia Grey and Miss Lett y Lind as the leading exponents of the fine art of fancy dancinq. 9

The skirt dance became so popular at the turn of the century that it was taught as a ballroom technique, and entered the popular realm of social dance. In an interview with Ruth St.

Denis we learn of one of her earliest danc+? debuts, Dressed in a reconstructed @allroom dress, she accompanied her mother to New fork to seek an audition for her "little skirt dance ... It was sufficiently good to win an enqayeaant at Worth's, fofloued by

The reintroduction of the lonq, flowing skirt initiated a change in movement which was oftm deewd suggestive of dances of antiquity:

The Skirt Dance broadened the scope of dancinq, fn itself n6ver a performance of very great artistic merit, it had all tho value of a revolt, I+, broke down the dominion of a tradition which had becoaa narrow. It opened up new vistas, It cortained the seeds of future movements. In particular it recalled the f orgottan dances of antiquity, Thauqh essentially modern, and notably so in its lapses into vulgarity, it nsvertheless suqqsstsd new possibilities in the grace of flowing drapery, the value of the fine, the simplicity and naturalness that were characteristic of Greek dance, 11

Hose than anyone else Lois Fuller was able to discover the choreographic possibilities inherent in this popular dance,

Serpentine, like the skis? dance, gas dependent for its effect ' on 'the manipulation of flowing materials. In 1389, Fuller was LetQ Lindgs understudy as Hercedes in garmen-UP-to-Data, and as her replacement must have lsarned some version of hef special dance. 12 It is no wonder then, that in the 1832 play Qgack,

PI. D., at the Harlem Opera House, Fuller chose a silky, voluminous skirt -t,o improviss the 1110vement scene invofvinq a young widow under hypnotic suggestion. The interplay of theatrical lightinq on the moving siXk skirt in this particular scene becama the basis of Serpentine dance.

Bhsn first auditioninq for the vaudeville staqe as a sola dance act, LO~EFuller had not yet named her movement sequence but only classified the Vwelve characteristic mctions"1J designed to take place under diff~rsntcofaured liqhts. In fact, it was the casino Theatre director who gave Pullas's luminescent skirt dance the naiae Serpentine and also und~rscoredit with a popular piece of music, Gilletqs Loin gal, after it was first introduced, this dance, which featured the ~anipulaticnof a great skirt creating curvilinear patterns in space, and which was often described as fleetinqly representational of natural images, underwent such elaboration,

Not only were various harmonies of colour thrown upon the dress, but also strange and uondesful patterns of flowers and lace and barbaric desiqns, The variety of effects thus obtained were endless. At one mowant the skirt was a moving wave of rose-pink; the next it had changed to a dark purple on which gleamed gcfden stars; aftaruards it took tha design of a Japanese embroidery; and aqain it became a flame of fire burning in the , darkness. And not content with these b2wilderinq displays some of thoss whose busicsss it is to refine upon vulgarity devised a startling and terrible novelty--they utilized the dancer as a backcf 0th and projected upon her photographs of the proniinsnt paople of the day,"l4 Carf Van Vechten, one of Aiuericays first dance critics,

describes t he sxaqqeratf cn of the skirt; "to insane proportions,

one hundred yards of enveloping silk exercised by iron rods into

tesrif ic aerial excesses.331s Loie f ull+r*s emplcyment of bioodea

sticks as limb extensions for manipulating her draped costumes was a technique derived from Japanese theatre. In her latter

years in paris, followinq the mounting public interest in Far

Eastern culture, fuller actually brought the Japanese

dance-dramatist ~adiYacco and coltlpany to her theatre for a y%ar long enqagement, Throvqhout all of Shsse chanqes in Serpentine, specific

aovanlents such as the prewilousiy mentioned $*peddlestep'j as swell

as the iq-rsaltzmovementn first introduced by Alice Zethbridqi?, re~ainedreiitarkably similar in their execution. Section V of Puller" dance, where, after canipleting a half turn, she arches

backwards until her head and upper torso are completely visible,

recalls nark Peruginiys dascription of Alice Lethbridgegs nlovely revolving movements, as when, in dancing the ordinary

waltz, she leant back until the upper half 05 hsf body was nearly horizontal and then rotated round hsrself . In Ritdha's Dance ~f Touch and &liriuru of thg Senses, Ruth St, Deals displays a nore acrobatic vsrsisn of this backward arch, a variation which was as inuch a typical vaudeville novelty as the splits and high kick.

In an article concsrninq ah Rise g +he Plusical Comedy &,n ---America, Arthur Todd suggests that $A+ origins of tha skirt dacce may be traced tc the East Indian Nautch influence. The

Wautch and Danse du Vsntrs were popularized dances of the Far

East which also featured the skirt as a flouiug frame to enhancs bodily movements, f n Delirium of 92 Senses, the sixth section of Radha, Buth St, Denis dons a gold skirt and drapes it coquettishly over her shoulders as a sari while delicately

portraying Eastern iaf luenced hand symbols reminiscent of the

Nautch danca, The sequence which follows iavolves the

manipulation of thrs undulating skirt while peddle-turninq. All

of these elements are charactsristic of the Nautch dance, In a

her Hindu dances is selaied to a gentral fascination with the Orient,

The fascination of the Orient is eternal, Womenls clubs that have sipped tea over pretty auch everything from Sun Worship to aental Science generally fall back on Eastern lore for things to be enthusiastic about. The *Road to FIandaEay* is ankle deep with the papers of progressive reading socie tiss. 17

Accounts of Arabic and East Indian dancers in America exist as

early as 1876, at the eleventh and Wood Street House, a variety hall aanaqed by Harsy Draw.

( I The group consisted of three men and tuo women; the men the wuslcfans, the women the dancers, The men sat on thts fioor; cne played an Armenian pipe, another a kind of violin, ths third a tabor or small drum which he beat with his hands in the macner of a swirg band brass slapper, The women wore short skirts and a silken band bound their breasts. Theif feet, in fact, the rest of their badigs were bars, 18 originally distinctive in their form, dances such as the NautcA and Dame du Ventre meldad tog2ther in Ansaican vaudeville under a multitude of names--Oriental, harem, hoozchiz- kootchie, cooch, shimmy and tassle, One might easily speculate that this form of exotic dancing inspired the later vogue for **bare-footed" dancing, which included Isadora Duncan and Ruth St, Danis as major exponents.

The original outburst of interest in flexoticsMof the

Orient which first began in 1865, subsided until the mid-1880's when Gilbert and Sullivan*~Plikado and J.H, Ravefly's Colossal Japanese Show of jugglers, tumblers and necromancers from 'the court theatre of hls Imperial Majesty the Hikad:, of Japae*, again brought tho Orient into public attention, From this point on, orientalism and exoticism in America achieved sensational popnlarity, Those who had been dazzled by the Rue a@ Caire at the Paris Exposition of 1889 would find it surpassed by the 1833 Chicaqo version of a Cairo street co~pletewith Alqerian,

Tunisian and Turkish villaqes, morish Mosques and Egyptian temples, as well as the wrigglings of 'Little Egypt*, an exotic dancer regularly -featured as part of thgs well-known exhibit,

The **daringi' or tienroticJt dance became "a staple ingredient ' in the shows of the nineties; Littla Egypt's dance at the

3 0 columbian Exhibition of 1833 elicited dozens of Fatimas, Cfsos,

Zazas and Pifi~.~~l~Theatrical directors such as ~uqustinDaly and Alfred Thcspson [teachers of Xsadora Duncan and Loie Fuller)

employed Bautch girls in their plays, And even Carmencita Dauset, a well-known Spanish vaudeville dancer, was to include

in her repertoire a spsctacuiar and extremely popular "Danse du Ventre" which she presented to American audiences in 1890.20

of the three American dancers Ruth St. Disnis %as the one

mst csapletely preoccupied with Par Eastern culture, f n Badha,

from the maasnt the curtain rises, when the incense is burninq

before the image of Badha on the throne cr altar, tho atmosphere

of Orientalism pervades the scen3. The offering of ffovers, the

beating of the gong, the chanting of the high priest before the

idol sf aadha &re. all presented as acts of Eastern worship.

Slowly as the spirit enters the idol, Radha risss, stsps down

and the sacred dance begins in a series of five circles

demarkinq the dominion of the five senses. Beaded amulets, garlands, bells and a small bowl are used as symbols of the

sense to be pictured in movemwit, ~inafdy,in a spinning ----Delirium gE the Senses, Radha renounces the sensual appetite and ,\ returns to the altar,

Ruth St. Dtnis in this highly theatrical dance attempts to

, explore her vision of Par Eastsrn lands steeped in n~ysticisraand ex~ticism.The sacred dance of the Hautch girls is co~binsdwith

the impersonation of the deif ied Radha whose spirit, according

3 1 ,to Indian mytholoqy, would on occasion enter into the idcl, stsp 1 down from the dais, and edify the elect with a dance. St, Dsnis 'frequently used the structure of actual oriental dances as a basis for her creatisne. Cobras, Fautcb and Incense, choreoqrapked IWU- fW6, ar? direct examples of her Western interpretation of classical eastern dances, The lighting, drama and decor of Radha ware, according to critics of the day, B~llascoesquein construction, 2% st, Denis, who spent five pears working for theatre playwiqht and director

David Belasco in ~elodraaaticproductions such as Zaza and ---Hadame Dubarrp, was particularly inspired by his realistic approach to set design, In Radha she had conceived an elaborate

Eastern temple setting, complete with Hindu worshippers, There were wEiower-wzea.thsd coconuts, twinkling iittia lamps on the shrine, and even the caste marks sacred to the Brahman priests who msditatefd] before the srnall brass idols 03 the Tow tabfe.ct22 Her desire for detail did net overlook the colcurinq of her body to a dusky bronze with a rosy hue staining the tips of her finqers and soles of her feet, hez eyes darkened with circles of soorma drawn around the inner edge. 23 (7

Yet St, Denis* stage design, although detailed, did not incorporate the specificity of realism which drove David Befasco to duplicate exactly the point lace coverlet of Plme, Dubarry8s be4 studded with brilliants and bordersd with sable, According to Lincoln Kirstein, hers was a personal se-creaticn ins~iredby **the Athanaem, and public library, cigarette cards and travel

phot~qsaphs.~2*Her employment of rather common motifs such as

the qonq, the incense, thz shrine surrounded by Oriental censers, screens and bric-a-brac illustrates that her know1edge in this area evolved out of popular sources.

Ruth St, Denis claitaed that popular events such as Little

Egypt at the Chicago Expcasltion, a pageant ballet called Eqypt

throu~ht& Centuri~sand a public exhibition of an East Indian

village at Coney Island were her early inspirational sources. Of

the Coney Island hippodrome St, Denis declares:

Bero for the first time 1 saw snake chariners and holy men and Nautch dancers, and somet hing af the fasciria tion of India caught hold of Be, Mhen f reached home that evening 1 had determined to create one or two Nautch dances, in imitation of those whirling skirted damsels, and possibly a faint echo of Plme. Sadi Yacoisic 1.25

The recent invention of electrical lightinq, a relatively

inexpensi va medium that could be manipulated to create and

quickly change th+ stage atmosphere, was rapidly incorporated

into the repertoire of stagecraft in vaudeville and popular theatre, St. Denis, in her adaptations oE Eastern danca to western stage conventions, employed lights and colour, just as

David Belasco had, to heighten thj drama of her ~erformances,

Loie Fuller, a featured actress in Alfred Thompson+s and Felix

Vincent's theatrical production, was also influenced by the play of .fight and color upon tha stage. In these productions such scenic transformations were so popular "that during the third week of the run of one pantomime spctacls, th6 scenery and chanqes alone were presentedOJ**6 /Panoramas, dioramas, cycloraaas and magic lantern shows ware almost as popular as stage spectacles during the nineteenth century. Loie Fuller inverted the method of moldinq liqht into shapes and forms on a static screen used in the above exhibitions by actually becoming the screen and fraqmentinq the liqht with her flowing, sf lken draperies,

gith a s~allband of electricians, Puller continued to explore techniques such as indirect cross beams and fuminous salts as well as variations of direct lightiuq, a later exam~le of her evolving creatirity was seen in Fire gance where sne evoked a fantastical image of smka and flames oy dancing on a pane of qhss lightad f xu& beneath.

Two final theatrical devices of the popular theatre which 4- influenced the works of Fuflar, Duncan and St, Denis were statue-posing and pantsmine, The former technique is related to the famous *statuaryt or *living tableauxs "imported from she continent and inspired in part by the controversy stirred up in

3843 by the public exhibition of Hifa& Powers* nude status, Greek Slave, P--- Enterprising theatre managers recognized the possibility of putting similar living statues on the stage, so Palao*s New York Opsra House presented a series of biblical tableaux.. ,Within a year at least seven , theatres in the city sere shoving tabfaaux, with others presented in taverns, hotels and salcons, The exhibiticns favoured themes f ram Greek aytholoqy* bf blicaP history or famaus paintings such as Venus Rising from the SeaM. Lydia Thompsonss ~ritishBlondes made a spectacular debut in United States, 18-63, uith staxuary display of frfower lirnbsi* in the short toqas they wore to play classical @ale~oles.~2t

Loia Eulfer, in an early staqe appearance of Serpsqtine / reportedly "ended each reappearance with a different pose, and at last whirling sank uFon the stage.fzza In Radha and Iphiqenia -in --Aulis, St. Denis and Duncan use posturing as a recurrent . wotif throuqh the dance, frequently returning to a ~restated pose. Nortense Koofuris, for example, begins & Gqi of -Iphisenia 9Aulis uith a profile Tanagran posturs which is repeated three more tiaes before the end of the dance. Isad~raDuncan, albeit in a much mase sophisticated form than her vaudevillean predecessors, also incorporated the timely themes of Grer3ce and f amus paintiays into her dgnceworks.

"The dance of Isadora Duncan, who finds inspiration for soae of her dances in fifteenth century Italian paintings, reveals itself as a mimic art. In the Angel Plavixiq the Pfol, she reproduces the arm movements of the bow, In the Primavsra, a choreographic copy of 3otticellias paintinq, she simulates the act of sowing flowers with her open hand,"zg

Duncan also uses this mimetic device throughout Iphiqeg;,xr~4.

IAulis a dance based on the characterization of Aqamemnongs dauqhter. fii a,the first and third sections, evokes the joyous dance of the Thessalfan inaiden, I phiqenia, with grace•’ul skips, swinq steps and runs. f n contrast, the austerity of her sacrifice in Air Lento is achieved throuqh slow walkinq, qlidinq and swayinq of tha body, Both Air and Air &Sn2:2 incorporate mime into the dance; the former in the act of strewing flowsrs over the staqe and audience, the fatter in the ritualistic raisinq of an offering to the gods.

The smployment of gestures or postures to convoy infarmation was an ever-papular technique used in tha theatre, as well as in the more classical pantoainiic acts featured in almost every yarietfr show of the time, trorking with directors

Augustin Daly and David Belasco, Duncan and St, Denis must have undoubtably cotns into ccntact with mime and gesture as well as Francois Delsarts's naturalistic theories of human expression, One of Isadosa3s earfiest acting experhencss included a pa~toininticcharacter in Biss ftyqiualiol. A Dance of Hilit&, choreographed at an eazlier date thaa fphiqggmi_a,\ demor.strates s very literal incorporation of mime into dance, I1Az one point in the dance she actually grabbed at the sides of the body in a direct response to the Hilton liae which says, 'And laughter holdieq both its sides*,"sQ following the decline of ballet in Wsstes~Europe, dance truly became a product cf the popular theatres and music halls.

In America, uhers ballet had never really astabiished itself, dance was popularized by pesfcrmers such as Carmencita, the

Spanish dancer ; Pat Rooney, the song-and-dance man; Lott ie

Collins, the high-kicker; Kate Yaughan and Letty Lind, the skist dancers and ititile ~gypt,the famous Nautch dancer. Although ~oisFull4r, Isadora Duncan and Ruth St. Denis / developed their dance styles to a more sophisticated level than their vaudevillean counter-parts, the early **bit partstr they performed in variety shows and theatrical productions inevitably affected their works. These inffuances showed thensefves in the alluring costumes and short yet arresting performances which characterized their work as well as in their continued use of the peddle and waltz movements from the famous skirt dance and the statuary posturings from li~inqtableaux.

Puller, Duncan and St. Dsnis eventually moved away from the concept of dance as divestisselaent in a variety show or play and established prsgra ms c~nsistinqof several short dance pieces, Their later choreography obviously underwent many chanqes,

Certain elaiaents remained the saw, houevar, including Fuiler8s interest in light and spectacle as wall as St, Denis* and

Duncan's persistence with the themes of Eastern exoticis& and

Greek idealism. As we have alrsady seen, such themzs and devices had their direct origins in ths tradition sf vaudevifls and popular theatre which flourishad throuqhout the major urban centres of late nineteenth century America, CHAPTER FOUR

T hs P hpsical Culture mvement and Applied ~esthsties of Defsarte in Ansrfca The Physical Culture Movement in general, and more

specifica llg the promulgation sf DelsarteVsphilosophy of ------dramatic expression, providad a @oral rat' L--- -.------" necessary before dance as an art forat could begin to flourish in 7------America, Chautauqua, an ios%itution which promoted the --- * - - popularizatiori of literature ""- ..- physical culture.

&ly In America at this tins there was a uidespread puritanical ,J i;i.

VIEWcf art, a view which terided to see creative .endaavours as

somewhat superfluous activitas that had no place in society of -h# physical energy aild hard work, Chautauqua, in the quzse aE i

dramatic readings, expanded to include excerpts from oparas and i-- ---* - .. - - - " -.~"- - --. Shak esentation sf entire

thfatrical arts, atizsd theories of , -

jus In particular, Genevieve L - Sfebbins, a Delsartian taacher and performer who presented danca

3 8 americans who still coonected theatre, and especially

vaudeville, with painted womsn and dissolute men, In an 1892 address to the National Association of Elocutionists, stebbins defends status-posing as an art, differentiating the Delsaritian method sf statuary from vaudevillean tableaux:

At a certain stage of this uork comes in statue-posinq, Here let me quickly add that 1 do not raean tableaux nrth wigs and whitewash, The statue-posing that f refer to is educational, leadinq on to pantomlae and qestur2.a This nsw school of Applied Aesthetics attained a wide sphere of influence from 1880- 1900 when a great deal of

Delsartian- based literature was added to the already popular market of books on spiritual. and physical health. These

included, to mention only a few, Steel ficKaye*s Graamas gf

,,-,,,,Pantomin6 ? Genevieve Stebbin's Delsarta's Systsg ~f Qyamatic

Expression and a book entitled mrmonic Gymastics $mJ -----Pantoreimic Expression which Olga Maynard declares was #@basicto the educatian of young ladies of the time,"z The influence of Delsarte is probably the sinqle most - - . ------.------'\

ittiportant factor in the early-- development- . .. - of American modern

dance, Its effect can be sea not ordy in the content, but also in the form and structure of the early Duncan and St. Denis \ -**---- "------dances. As St. Denis stoutly maintained in a 1906 inteaview

ttDelsaste, the much ridiculed, is, in spite of all the silliness

and stupidity that has b&on committed in its name, the best foundation of all truly expressive dancinq.a93

The European Delsartian voque infected Amrica in the late nineteenth century, However, the history of Delsartism in

America and its effect on modern dance is an especially T difficult and obli4ue path to trace from its place of European

origin. Tad Shawn, in his book Every Little Hovemat, reports that "...fro@ the start the Delsarte craze swept America and

held absolute swag for tho next twenty years,#*

Just as in present day America coaic strip characters have given rise to the aanufacturing and sale of such articles as Hop-a-lonq Cassidy costumes for children and space hehets, etc,, in the 1830" sons finds in aaqazines adver tisemnts for "Delsarta corsatsH, l'Delsarte COBOS~~CS'~,vW~81sart~ gownsH and me aanufacturar even advertised a "Delsarte wooden lag, tt4

Unbeknownst to Delsarte, who developed his aesthetic theoriss for European singers and actors, two ycung American

dancers had begun to apply his principles of dramatic expression

to their own art form. As children both fsadora Duncan and Ruth /i " 1 St.- - Denis- ---experienced .- . - aspects of the American interpretation of /

Delsarte8s methods, St. Dsnis, her autobiography, discusses -- -- in her early lessons in the technique of Delsarte.

The boarders who wera a desperate necessity to the budget used to call me wDelsareefi, because of the , lessons that mothsr gave ~taefro@ tilne to time. In Neu Haven, not long before, she had met a Badame Pota, who was a ssveoth attenuation of a pupil of Prancuis Delsarte, Her technique was dubious but her enthusiasm contagious, 3 vaguely remember a little book with soae sketches in it of extremely chaste ladies and gentlemen standinq straiqht and nude in poses of Delsaste relaxation and posture. s

aae. Aurilfa Cclcord Pot9 who kept a studio in carnegis Hall,

offered lessons in reading, dramatic art, vocal and physical culture, with her particular attention to the alleviation of nervous disordes she ~usthave appealed to the neurasthenic Hrs,

Dennis. Ruth also recalls standing at the foot of the the brass bedstead '*with Bother sitting in her gingham aFron holding this

book and directing EI~movements. I qraspsd the rail of the bed,

suinginq my long legs to and fro, doing the numberless exercises that were the actual beyinning of all wy dancinqBfi6Later, in

woflrs such as Badha's Dance Smell, the low-lag swing would be

used repeated1 y. This movement, which Ted Shawn describes as

tlf undamental to Dalsarte",7 is evan more noticeabls in Duncan's -Air ---Gai of Iphiqenia & Aulis, a dance composed almost entirely of low-leg skips and swingsteps, th Isadora Duncan." - - * Delsaste*~ technique are nct so easily traced, fn order to envision the ------connection of Duncanis dance style to Dzlsarteas theories it is

-- "*- %= * necessary to look at the ~riqinalDelsarta theory as well as tho --- -? - -- Aaericanization of that theory, k""*" - -- Throuqfi a scientific study of human expression in everyday

life, Delsar-te originally evolve6 a theory whereby actors couf d 9 \J dispense with stock, pantomimic gsstures and project inner L- "-- -- - U i-4 .ri 3 +.' +-' 3 5E: fa nf' 4 W 2- ci s; Q. .ri m U a v) cr,a, *r(a M' 4-j S 0 F.(: '3 a 'd a & a W 0, u2 0 * historical skudy of danca education in America before 1900,

Stebbins once stated thst., Delsarte aesthetic gymnastics verg purely an American idea, It was the uninformed instructors who had little or no idea of the philosophy of Delsarte that caused it to become known as the "doctrine of The system was based on exercises that stressed relaxation, It af so stressed the use of statue-pcsing and tableaux- making that purported to show the various emotions, 1% was the recitation or the singing of a songag Stebbin's wHarmoaic Gymnasticsn davaloped through a

combination of Swedish q ynmastics and a physical application of r Delsartei s aesthetic: ?he Swedish systent is based on tha sama premise of the value of sfow ~otionand held attitude as givinq time for nutritive changes in cellular tissue, An exclusive use of the Swedish system is detrimental to expression, but coabined with the aesthetic it proves valuable. a 0

It is interesting to note that later both Isadcra Duncan and - - - -

their forms of dance instruction; can, like Stebbins, k ------

the body, the real dance is ~nattainable.~i' ------.- - - Genevieve Stebbins, who preceded Isadora Duncan by alinost a

decade often wcra only a white Gref k tunic while presenting her

dances and lectures based on the theories of Prancois Delsarte,

Her eiarly works (1880's) consisted primarily of dfa~atic readings and statue i~psrsonationssuch as Diana Discovering --Endymior,, ~uqustusCupid wL&h &z, A~o11oBelvedere, Venus ~ressinq&g air, Dying GIadia-to_s and others, By November 25,

1892, when 811th St, Dsnis vi2wed 3 matinee performance includinq

~iobestatue-poses, Eyth Ssis, and f' Dance ~f ilDr Stebbins had evolved her technique to the inclusion of pantomine and gesture, Ruth especially recalls the dignity glvsn to the human body "luovinq in the Grecian atmosphere of grace and liyht,'Jaz

To me at this early age nothing so beautif uf had ever entered ay life, The curtain rose on a daxk greenish backqsound (this was, of course, long before Isadorals famous blue curtains) and there stood an axquisite woman in a cr>stutas made of soft ivory white-material that fell in gracious lines to her feet.,, She moves in a series of plastiques which were based upon her underskandinq of the laws of mokion discovered by Defsarte, Her poses wese derived from Greek statuary and encompassed everything from the tragedy of Miobe to the joyousness of Terpsichore. 1

Although it is not known if Isadora Duncan evar saw

Genevieve S twbbins, her aain predecessor iu the revival cf Greek dance, there is some evideace that Duncan, like Stebbins, was I avam of ths teachings of Dslsarte. Gordon Craig, a longtime friend and lover of fsadora, affirmed this point in a BBC interview:

But 1: [do 3 believe that that forqotten man, Del Sarte, [sic] helped her through his book, Oace I found a copy of this boak in her room when I was looking for a trunkful of books 1 had lent her, f did not find the trbnkful, so f took this one, Rany thousands of people in Alrterica and Francs studied this beck by Del Sarte, and yet very few of thase thousands ever gleaned a3y secrets iron its pages, B word or two to a genius like Isadora is always enough., ,* *

The posinq and elocutionary methods of Delsarte are further exemplf fied in on,? of Duncan's first dance pieces, Dancing to '73a ti? is

I'd IC lr

3" d tA ti. ai rn I-' P- cn tr P 'I, t-' (1, and St, Denis proclaimed the torso as the center of 311

mavenrent. Isadorag in My Life, relates how she,

, spent long days and nights in the studio seeking that dance which might be the divine expression of the human spirit thrcugh the medium of the body's movement. For hours I would stand quite still, my two hands folded between my breasts, coverinq the solar plexus.,,.I was seekinq and finally discovered the central spring of ail movenaent, the crater 05 motor power, the unity from which all diversities of movements are born,. ,a7

Duncan's declaration of the solar plexus as a source of movement

reiterates the already established Delsartian views related to

the centre of the body.

The torso represents the moral ele~entor love of beinq, It is the weight and centre of the being. It is the core so to speak, of %he man.%@

As a result, contrary to ballet which focused on the iriavement possibilities of the dancers' 1imbs, the torso

movements of the modern dancer became of prime importance, In --air ---Gai of Zphiqenia Bujis, Bortanse Kooluris alternately avercurves her back aad arches her chest adding exuberance to

the previously stated upright skipping combination, Ruth St. Denis, in gnc2 of Scund, sinks into posture 111 balancing

on cne leg, her torso remarkably curved (like a larqe wC*s), her centre of gravity very low. Genevieve Stebbins wrote in Delsarte*~zys%em of Rrarnatfc Expression, "the zones of the torso are points of departure or

arrival for a yesture.nl9 The use of succession, in which the

movement beqins in the torso and ripples outwards through the desired part of the body was originally a technique taught by stebbins, particularly in her Serpenting Arms exercises. Eater, both Duncan an6 St. Denis used successionaf arm movements, a technique frequently described as a source of fascination to audiences who hitharto had seen the arm mvsd as single unit in the well known talletic style. St, Dsnis1 rippling arms, a leitigotif of early dances such as Incense and Cobras, as well as the culmination of DeIirium of %@ Senses often caussd a gzzat deal of excitemsnt.

I knew that my arm ripple was the subject of much interas% and speculation cn the part of the public, fn ths Incense my arms were held out fro@ the shoulders and were raised and lowered with a subtle rippllinq movement which began between the shoulder bladss and seemed to extend through and beyond the fingers. 20 Duncan's successional arm ~ovementswere much larqer than St, Denis*, and thus tendd to exhibit an unfoldinq rather than rippling action. These unfoldinq arms held uplifted to the sky, hands hanginq lilnply from the wrists, became a trademark of

Duncanesque dance, Yet, this gesture so indicative of Duncan's style was by 1893 already a typical movement taught as an exercise ia ppular, inexpsnsive Delsarte pocketbooks includfnq Greciaq picturs Dance or Dream nacient Greece. Exercise 1: Raise the right arm ((with the hand inclined dcwnward) as high as the shoulder carrying it, well outward as it goes up, the ara sliqhtly curved, the fingers the second and third a little nearer to the palm than tho third and the fourth, Hold the hand steady letting wrist move downward until the hand is extended upward, then in this position, lower to the side. 23

his is the arm qesture we see as Bortensa ~oofurisskips across the stage in $232; sha lifts her aras, hands hanginq limply

from the wrist as she skips, overcurving her back, then unfolds her arms downward as her chest arches upward. B' - -- \ In order tc further attain the dynamics of movement and i flow, Duncan and St, Denis not only einploysd successional

motion, but also the Americanized principles of tension and relaxation based on D~fsarte'slaws of reaction and recoil, The Delsartian teaching poem 2 Shot gg &row, mentioned aarlier, indicates the interaction of these two oppositional yet

interactinq dynamics; the gesture involved in drawing back the

bowstrinq enacts a ntomen t of tension before the ensuing release,

,filthouqh Duncan and St, Denis never- ---- con~gfekely eliminated ------static

posturing-. from their dancss,...-..---- the contrasting- -- w n"Ldynamics -" -- of Sension and relaxation added ------

with this acquired sense of relaxation in moveoaent, they, unlika kalPet dancers, used the forces of qravity and wefqkt to explore the dimensions of kneeling, sittiny and even lyinq on the

With the acceptance of Delsarte's theory of the torso as the **coreg9of man, Genevieve stebbins developed a series of exercisss which concentrated on the use of qravity and change of

weight. She categorized these aesthetic gymnastic drills as: -- 48 Exercise I - Back Fall; Exercise XI - Front Fall; Exercise 1x1 - Kneeling; Exercise fV - Eawing; Exercise v - Sitting; Exercise VI - Rising from Sittinq; Exercis~VII - Risirig from Backfaff; ---etc, In considering theso exercises one cannot help but recall the sensuous sitting and lying positions which initiate Radhals ----Delisaua of = Senses or her final climatic backwards fall. Upon risinq to return to the throne, St. Denis deftly raises her torso with the aid of her aria and swings into a kneeling position in the manner demonstrated in stebbints Exercise VII.

APthouqh it cannot be determined whethsr the young Ruth St.

Denis ever read Genevierre S-tsbbin*~drill books, it is nevertheless intriguing to specify the striking similarities in movilment which indicate possible patterns of i2f luence.

The Spiral Sway drill, in Stebbin's gynaiuic Breathitla and ---Harmonic Gyaaastf cs, instructed the reader to produce a semi-circular rhythmic dance lrtotioa through shifts of ~sighton the balls of the feet, his may hava been the source of the

Zasic movement in St, Denis-ncense, as well as the spiral spinning in Radhass Delirium of ,tt Senses. Wn even closer resersblance between Stsbbins and St. eni is reveals itself ia ths fact that stebbinss theories of spiral movement were derived from the shifting weight moveasuts of oriental dance, In 1893, when D~namicBreatbinq and gqrmonic ~ymnasti~s#as published, ihq author-dancer had taken a new philosophical approach, aovinq away from neo-classicism towards mysticism. In pointinq out sources for Stebbiass chzmqe of outlook Suzanne Shelton suggests that it probably had something to do with fate nineteenth century popular trends, a theory she supports with the EolPoainq statement from an 1897 review of stebbin's book: "This is just the kind of book to interest fashionable people who are attracted by the Buddhistic philosophy. "23

Two of Stebbin's dances, Myth of Isis and Dance pf

Illy,* had a profound effect on St. Denfs one Ncvenber day in

3892, In her autobiography written years later she remembered, in vivid detail, the graceful aovments of the dancer,

,, , she did a dance called .Dance of Day. At the openinq of the floor asleep, and than, awakened by the aorning sun, she rose with a Lovely childlike movement to her knees and bathed herself in the rays. 18 light rhythmic step signified the morning and ths noontide; and then began the slower moraments of the afternoon, pressntfy rningled with saCasss as the late rays brought her sPouly to her knaes and agai~into her reclining posture sf sleep.24

The themes of Eqpptian life that Denis had witnessed in

Stebbin's Byth Isis, as well. as the diurnal-noctural cycles outlined above, are re-echoed in St. Denis' BCIYP~~(1910), a theatrical tala of the rise and fall of Egypt during the pglriod of a day and a night. The third section of Eqypta, _The Dance of --Day opens with a figure asleep on the floor, an obvious reflection of Stebbin's earlier danco. In a taped interview, Ruth St, Denis explained that Stsbbins had inspired her use of ------* fiuth St. nenis called Genevieve's solo The Dance of m. It is not known if this is the actual. title. draperies and helped bricg about that qrcombination of spirituality and spectacia** uhich became 'the basis of her career,25 An element of obvious inportance in these early aodern dances was a style of gesture that illustrated a closer link to the theories of Delsarte than to the tschniques of ballet. Balletic gesture in the nineteenth century had evolved to the state of set, external siqnals, recognized and accepted by both performer ana audience. Cuncan and St, Denis appear to have developed their qastural styles based on the American interpratation of Delsarte*s naturalistic f crm of expression, having already come into contact with such farms through their involvement with vaudeville and the popular theatre of Auqusein

Daly and David Belasco, Quoting Defsarte, Stebbins wfites, that gesture shoula always "be takc;~straight from nature,"Z* and later adds her own colnasnts in this regard: **followthe psychology of Mature. All. else is mechanical, fa1se.27 Duncan declared that the oceans and the mountains taught her to dance, while st, Denis claimed inspiration faom trees in a storra, the ntstien of clouds in a suaset or the quivering crouch and final spring of a tiqer-za It is more probable however that their movement source originally hailed from Delsarte3s naturalistic theories of expression. Tbe Nay Applied Aesthetics recognizsd a 3'physiokoqical correspondence to ths psychic faculty which, if uncbstsucted

5 1 I .. .carried outward into pantominsi\ 29 Duncan always cautioned ,

\ students to begin any gesture from an inner desire, and to be strongly conscious of the impulse before moving, no matter how small or gentle the qesture,so In this consext ws can begin to understand a ccmnent by Hugo Von Bcffmanstahl who, when askzd what h3 meant by "truets aovsmnt, replied that t'the raovamerlts of these women (Duncan and St, Denis) when they dance are true; tha move~sntsof the Europeans are fal~%,~~l

Like Defsarte, these early modern dancers desired to unite and project inner thoughts and emotions with outer movaments. ,I They believed that ndance was capable of creatinq &ore than a momentary diversion in ths aztention of the audience and was in fact capable of moving p~opledeeply aad seriously.flJZ Yet, unlike Daisarte, thsy did not approach movement from an analytical process of exploration, obssrvatioa and classification.

Exploration was surely a function of the early dances of

Lois Puller, Zsadora Duncan and Ruth St, Denis. Their choreographic and Peachinq skills however, lacked th+ basic analytical framework that Delsarte was able to brfnq to the theatre. This fact, along with the financial necessity to serve the entertainment requirements of the commercial Morth American th~atsaskept the early works of the modern dance pioneers bound to .vaudeville theatrics and, as we shall see to popular and commercial trends in fashions and the arts. CHAPTER PIVE

Popular and Commercial Ieagery In Bmerica, particularly Nsu York, tba early modern dancers came into contact with Zuropean artistic trends throuqh commerciaf vehicles such as men's and ladies* fashions, advertisements, posters, interior decorating and architectural design. ~ndentGreece and the Far East were recurrent popular

Sheass not only in the theatre but also as visual intaqes ir, the surrounding cityscape, Fashion industries of the nineteenth century popularized the Grecian-bend and the loose-fitting qown, as well as exotic' accessariss such as oriental fans, peacock feathers and parasols.

It was an sra of sclecticism, a trend particularly noticeable in architecture and interior decorating. The Neo-classical and Gothic st yfes es",ablished af tsr the Civil Edar were rivalled, $US not surpassed, by the Oriental craze initiated in part by the Centennial Exposition af 1876, Subsequently, the ~ostfashionable mansions had Boorish, Turkish or Chinese roorns d~coratedwith t.;akwood and Indian brass tables, Oriental caxpets, urought iron wall hangings and other exotica, The papular Tiffany touch with its adopted decorative style froa Art Nouveau displayed light and coloured qlass in naturalistic themes that included mean4ering streams and fantastic cloud formations, the outliaes of flower petals and tha veininq of leaves, Even thtir park fountain, in New 'York8s

Union Square, with its newly acquired pond lilies and lotus flowers, was evldence of this growing exotic trend.

For the most past, the early American aodern dance choreoqraphers did not have a direct awareness of the~r inspirational sources. In their autobiographies they seldom recall the original ideas, movements or forces that caused the& to choreograph a particular dance, AS a result it is difficult to trace ths irsspiraticnal sourcas especially cf their earliest dances, iiowever, the striiiirig similarity bet wen the content of early American posters and advertisements and the content of early American modern dance illustrates an important link which qenarally passes unnoticed. The European poster mania hit America in the 38901sa Xecent technological developments in litnoqraphy had expanded the field of visual arts to include the general public. Posters, adver tissments, book illustrations and art repfaductions became widely distributed in Western Europs and in the latter quarter of the nine teenth century reached America, As a result, tha latest English and Parisisn fashions, as well as the popular lithographic styles includinq Art Nouv3au were bsouqht to tne American peo~le.

The designs of 3ugsn.s Grasset, a European artist who in

3889 became very influential in the dsveloping pcster industry in Aaerica, aptly illustrate the popular thematic trends in this new for@ of commercial art, His sources of inspiration, like other European poster artists, generally arose from:

$*the art of the Middle Ages, of Persia and Eqypt, Japanese woodcuts, Botticeffi and the English Prs-Raphaelites. His stainad glass uindows, tapestries, wall papers and posters show a predilection for two-dimensional design, strong contours and muted colors, His posters for Harpas's were modern yet not so avant-garde or foreiqn as to offend thc; educated but conservative readers who formed its clientele,"l

Othqr European graphic artists such as Charles Ricketts, Aubrey Beardshy, Carlos Schwabe, Alphonsa Mucha were also keenly aware of the French Symbolist cli~atsof the time and incofporatsd many of the favourite Symbolist chemes into their works. Hill Ha

Bradley, Louis J. Rhead and John Sloan represent a faw of the early American poster artists who in turn were greatly in•’luenced by their EuroFean kinsmen and f urthar distributed the varied graphic styles and *hems to the Amrican public.

The artistic poster craze played an inportant rola in the develcpment of commercial lithography and advertisinq. In this brazen age of advertising unhampered by lsgislation, advertisements trranging froin handbills to sheets of gigantic prcportion dominated the scene in cities and towns, and even in ' rural areas thsre was no escape iron! thzrnll.2 In the face of over-production and under-consumption, the quality and quantity of advertising axpandod in the 1890's. Formerly uninspired commercial bills were replaced with eye-catchirsg visual imagery, often ileitativa in both style arid content of the aforsmantioeed European poster artists. In addition, Greek Revivafism mairitained its popularity in middle America, even though the artistic credo of the day, as published in kg Pstit Journal j& ---Ref usee presented $~Classfcism,prostrate on thci ground, traapled upon by a Beardsley female, a Japanese actor and an Indian woman {apparently symbolizing the young American art) whils two other fiqures represent Death and the Devil,**J The arising bicycle industry was particularly attuned to the new graphic trends, with advertisements for Orient, Apollo,

Coluabia of Victor Cycles, Such advertisemats sported the flak , compositional values of Japanese design and frequently featured the graphic style 0f Art Souveau. Exotic women in Eastern qarb were used to prcmote the sales of various ciqarettes and mdicinah tonics, while the Grecian woman draped in a loose-fitting tunic, wha appeared as early as 3820, was still $ good seller: in 1890, Still other advertisements such as Eorax

Soap and small mayazino flyers capitalized on famous E uropeaa paintings such as The Birth 2) Yenust grimavera, fEhiqellia and %&r>l~2,

, The use of line arid content in the *style naderneS which infected poster art in America are of particular interest in relation To ihs dances of Loie Fuller and Ruth St. Denis.

The most conspicuous and recognizable characteristic of the art nouveau style in France as in other countries was the use it laado of long, flowing, interlacinq linear patterns, It came to France at a time when the line was already triumphant, when the graphic arts in Paris had reached a very high level of accomplishment and the linear qualities of Japanese art and pictorial cogposition were inf luencinq many of the new painters such as Gauguin and Toulouse-Lautrec, This use of lines in art nouveau had been inspired by a study of natural shapes, particularly of plants. Theories and books on the subject of $*natural rnovemsntqf in line and form were oncousaqed in a number of progressive art schools., ,*

Loio Pulleri s earlisst dances explored the alovinq sculptural possibilities cf light reflected on continually flowing lines cf

drapery, flex titles, gI%g Butterfly, x& Violet and heainbow, illustrate her fascination with popular naturalistic t hemss, f n --Serpentine the he^ of her undulating skirt formad siapla pictorial images which were interpreted by audiences as qiant lilies, orchids, winged moths and golden chalices. In a dance entitled The flower, Puller further explored the naturalistic inspiration of *le style moderne* appearing csmpletely clothed in garlands of interwining flowers. St. Denis was to reiterate this these in Radha's Dance of Sm~3.1,

The influence of Japanese art and the interest in the far East snaarqsd as well in the commercial graphics of American companies such as Whiting Paper, Victor Bicycles and Overman Rheel, Barlock Typeuriter, Inland Printer, 222. f mages of exoticism and hallenism in the graphic f crms of Isis, salome,, \ Apollo and fphiqenia, became wall established in the field of

57 advertisinq, It was, in fact, from a common cigarette poster of

~qyptianDieties that St, ~erisclaimed to have received the inspiration which changed her carser from actress to dancer.

This sealed image of Zsis, a superficial comaercial drawing for a cigarette company, opened up to me in that moment the whole story that was Egypt. Hers was an external image which stirred into instant consciousness all that latenz capacity for wonder, that still and meditative lore of beauty which lay at the centre of my spisit.5

Drawing froa popular repfssentations of th~occult, the exotic and the sensuous, from images of the femute fatale and the lotus bllossow, St, Denis created Radha, Egygt_a and Incense. In --Radha she assumes the ideal iaaqa of the femme fatale and throuqh taovemsnt denotes symbols such as tha lotus, the Buddhist square and the five interlinking circles of the senses, It is a symbolic dance, employ~ngsuch properties as florsrs, wine etc., all the senses being expfesP, f sic) through the madim of waving hands and uoven paces, 6

Isadora Duncan's early dances reflect the still psevalent popular American interest in Greek classicism, From 1820 on, decades after the European interest in classicism, America sought new cultural direction from the ancient worlds of Greece and Rome. The em6rgence of the professional architect, coming at a time of change in popular ?aste, was ideafly fitted to hasten the developaent of a nsn and characteristic style. ., ,that the Classic Revival forms were not new set categories imposinq a new slavery of desiqn, but rather a powerful means of braakLnq off the shackles of . the past--became a controlling factor in the American Classic Rjviva1,7 After 1830 the Greek Revival reigned supreme on this side of the ocean; thus the architects comnissionad to design splendid buildings for the new capital city of Washington turned to Greak models for their inspiration. From Pashington, this obsession with Greek forms swept Philadelphia and New York, storminq through smaller cities on its way, Victor Saroff, in z& Real nsadern, writes of #*a general

American interest (and version of) an ancient culture, resultinq \/ at that tints in many a popular lecture series front many a highbrow podium in which Americans tended to congratulate themselves as direct heirs of Athenian democracy and its attendant arts, slides and illustrations sf the Acropolis wara popular in many hones, though uhat was kncwn of the era1 ancient

Greece was rather limitedens The Duncan fa~i3.yillustrated an early interest in hellenism, especially Isadora8s fazher who fashioned the safety deposi-t vault in his bank after the Greafr style and also wrote poetry celebrating the antique shores:

See the centuried mist is breaking! Lo, the free Hellenic shore! Piarathon - Platoea tells Greece is livinq Greece once mose. 9 Fleeting pestuses and ritualized offerings rernfiaiscent of f iqures on a hellenic f rieza reappear throughout Duncan *s Iph,iqen& & Aulis. Such a dance is an obvious reflection of an

American view which idealized the forms of Greek and Roinan art and architecture, Duncanis loose-fitting Grecian style of drass,

at times more revealing than the usual uncorsetsd figure, was not an entirely new fashion, The struggle to retain or discard corsets in wcmenls dress was a popular subject of this time, ' Dress styles, especially in lounge-wear, had already bequn to alter from the angular bustle and the fancy gathered folds of

the Watteau toilette to softer and simpler lines,

As early as 1850 European artistic dasignsrs offered the loose-fitting Pre-Raphaelite and Greek gowns as aesthetic

alternatives to khs cursated figure, Tn the 1830ts Aubray

Beardslsy and Henry van der Velde, among other exponsnts of Art Nouveau, becaae increasingly interested in dress modes and

presented in their graphic works the modified Greek style of

high vaisted dresses, This uncorss tjd figure quickly becam the

vogue of modera co~msrciahart, both in America and Eur~pe,

Stella Newton, in her book Health1 Art and peason, reiterates Walter Cranes's comments concerning the new designs in vomen*s dress:

I think that there can be no doubt.,.of the influence In our time a•’what is contmonly known as the Pre-Raphaeiitic schcol.. ,Under the new impulse, the inspisa?ion from the mid-century fro^ the purer and simpler lines, forms and colours of early medieval ars, the dress of women in our own tias may be seen to have been tr ansfar~adfor a while, ,, 10

From what we kncw of Laie Fuller's magnificent, ffowinq costurnas it .is easy to see how the works of this dancer were affected by chanqing styles in dress and the images of the fenme Eatale in the postars and advertiswernts of As",ouveau, The eastern exoticism of Ruth St, Denis was also based on poplar aad commercial trends in the field of lithography. Her inclination to dress in the costumes of ancient Egypt arose from an imaginative eacounter with an imaqe of Tsls displayed in an ad for Turkish cigarettes.

At the turn of the century Awerican innovations in advertising, fashion, posters and architecture transformed

European and classical models of artistic ex~ressionand created an abundance of thaws and popular images which contributed qreatly to the appearance of a new cfrorographic style. As the elite artists of Europe and America were seekinq a modsrn style dissociated fro^ the bcrrowed eclscticism of arcisnt Greece and

Ro@e or Far Eastern lands, tha early modern dancers were actually using these well established trends as thematic aaterial for their dances, Plate 1: Loie Fulfer

Plate 2: J.C. Leyendecker, The Csmtusy, 1896

Plate 3: Louis Ahead, The Century, 1896

Plate 4: J,C, Leysndecker, The Interior, 1898

Plate 5: Zoie Fullor, Serpentine huis Rhead, The Century, 1896. (from: The Golden Age of the American Poster)

hie Fuller, Serpentine. (from: Chronicles of the American Dance) J. C. Leyendecker, The Interior, 1898. (from: The Golden Age of the Americep poster) Plate 6: The Ciqamtte Poster Which Inspired

Ruth St, Denis' Career as a Dancer

Plata 7: Ruth St, eni is, A Costume Inspired

By The Cigarette Poster - -.. -- - Ruth St. Denis. A costume (never actually used in performance) inspired by the poster. (from: Miss ~uth) Plate 8: Ruth St, Denis, Radha, 1906

Plate 9: Unknown, 9899

Plate 1.0: J.C. Leyendecker, The Inland

Printer, 1897

Plate 11: Buth St. Denis, Radha, 1306 I;,Q?p,~;;~g *. .

I &dcib dbtIil1t~4i

Ruth St. Denis, -adha, 1906. (from: The Dance in America) 1 Lung or Throat ise ease.;^ ,

I . - -- Unknown, 1899. (from: The American Poster)

Ruth St. Denis, Radha, 1906. (from: Kiss ~uth) Plate 12: Will Low, Scribner's, 1895

Plate 13: Tsadora Duncan, New York City, 1838

Plate 14: Theatre Advertisement,

San Francisco, 1882

Plate 15: Isadora Duncan

Plate 16: Unknown, 187?

Plate 17: United States Lottery

8dvertisemant, 1820 Isadora Duncan, (from: The Art of the

Theatre Advertisement, San Francisco, 1882. (from: The History and Development of ~dvertising )

Unknown, 157?. (from: The Anerican poster) - " NO. 11. Swlb nlrds-t. , -- GILLESPIE'S United States httery Advertise- ment, l820. (from: The History and Development of Advertisinq) CHAPTER SIX Epilogue Io their search for acceptance as ssrious artists of th.; dance Loie Fuller, Xsadcra Duncan and Ruth St, ifenis evantually left the entertaingent tradition of Aiaerican popular thsatre and made the transatlantic migraticn to Europe. Fuflar achieved almost instantaneous success upan her asrival in Paris, Duncan and St, Denis came in 1900 and 1906 respactivsly, and established their reputations in London, Berlin, Paris and throuqhoul Europe,

Even before Fullergs arrival. in Paris, her success was already being ensured by Hallarme and otber Symbolist artists who had bequn to praise dance as the pursst theatrical art form, as the perfect melding of visual and musical ele~ents,Mallacme, in his theories of art, considered the thaatre as thi; comon man's riqht to the vision of the ideal. Dancing realizes the intaginary, offers to the poet his Vision, and reveals to hi^ the nudity of his concepts. Dancinq alone can attain this purity; dancing alone can translate the fleeting and the sudden right to the very Idea, our glimpses of which are of ths same nature as the daace; unexpected and transitory, fading just as wcs atterrtpt to seize them. Dancing, the paradise of all spirituality, is symbolic of our highest aspira'tions, it is the ensembfs of forms through which the human body expresses the visual incorporation of the Idea and points out, higher than the painted ceiling of the theatre, some star.= fascinated by the ephemeral nature of danca, HalLarme souqht to free the staqe from ths traditioilal. dacor which he believed only fettered the imagination. Thus, when Loie Fuller performgd in paris, animatinq and carvinq the ~TJ,CO~through her play of

1 lights and swirling draperies, nallarm procfaiaed La Loie t$e

The staqe shunned by leaps or hard to the paints, acquires the virginity of a spot undreamed of, that thz figure isolates, and will reconstruct and adorn. Ths enchantress creates her environment, draws it out of hezself and gathers it in again in a silence of quivering crepe de Chine.2

In elaborate language that continually exalts the ideal, European critics such as Flallarnie and Valery have forever glamourized Loie Fuller as a metaphor of the nineties, The emblematic nature of her wvoment was oftea the focus of these critics* reviews. **The dancer fs not a wornan,** remaskad Hallarme,

",,, but a nietaphor summariziriq one of the elementary aspcts of our form, blade, cup, flows, stc,. ,,"3 Loie Fuflef dancinq figure, which at times comple tsly disappeared into the swathes of waving draperies, fulfilled Hallas~e~sconcept of a depersonalized theatrical art in which $*nothing interposed between the idea and the

To retain such high critical accfaini it was not nacessary for Puller to abandon the world of music hall entertainment, Following her initial failure to secure an engagement at the Paris Opera House, she danced priaarily at tha Folies-Berqere and finally in her own theatre, Her performance at these popular

Past of the appeal of th~satwo dancers was a result of early American roots which had fostered the eleaents of expansiveness and optimism, primitiveness and simplicity. D uncaa and St, Denis had arrived in Europs at a time when dancs, like\ music, was rscsiving a qreat deal of prestige for its natural, primitive and non-discursive qualities. Duncan, with her classicaP da nee of ela se ntal movements--running, walking, skipping, standing, lyinq, etc,--expressed a pure simplicity of forin, St, Denis displayed a pagan innocence with her infusion of spirituality and puritanism into the street dances of zhe Nautch or Danse de Vents@, ~hus,zhe sculptor ~oseClara praised Duncan's dancing as a revelation of fiCertafnty, Simplicity,

Gfanaeur and Haraony,'fs while in the dance of Ruth St. Denis, riuqo von Hof f manstahl. re juiced over the wc~iiibirtilti~nof a strangely alive being with priaeval tzadition.fl9 The English author aavelock Elfis proclairtled dancs as *#the loftiest, ths most rttovinq, the mast beautiful of the arts, because it is no mere translation of abstraction from life, it is life it~elf.~*xo fa responding so ~ositi~@Jyto the American dancers, r critics in Europe were reacting to thsmes which, while initiated', I in Europa, had been soaehow infused with a new form and \ I vitality. Their appreciation of the "Certaintyf8 and **SimplicityH ' of these dances were recoqnitions that Eufopean themes had been , translated into a uniqu9 Bmszican idiom, It has been the purpose of this essay to show that the roots of this American idiom entend into a tradition cf popular culture, The rsvisws of such - - .- - intelligent critics as Stephen* Mallerne and Paul Valery, while ssrvinq as a tremendous catalyst for the appreciation of C modeanism ir! dancs, do not always presant an accurate depiction of these early dance forms. Phils full of rhapsodic acclaim for fullsrys spirituality as an ambodiaent of the *Idea1 they complete1y disregard her frequmt use of popular tunes and her recurrent reliance on the siaple pedal3 s-tap for lucom~tion,

Puller, Duncan and St, Deais attempted, with varying success, to ssparat e t hearselves from the entertainment world of vaudeville and music halls, Perhaps it was their acceptance amnq European artistic circles that Isd each of these dancers in their autobiographical. writings to overlook their formative years in America. Duncan, for instance, almost compietef y disreqarding the particulars of her early stage devefopaent claims, ia & ~i.•’a,that Nietssche, Jean-Jacques Rousseau,

Bhitmarr and a visit to ancient Greece were the COZ~%~ZS~O~~S of her dance. similarly Loie Puller leads one astray in a fanciful account of her "accidental, dis~ovsry'~of the -Serpentine dance, never taking the time to mention its direct connection to the skirt dance of the day, An examination of the views of dance historians colzcesninq these dancers does little to clarify these ovsrsiqhts, If we are to .believe these historians we need to be satisfied that

Duncan's "first dancing masters uera wind and blav$31qg1a "Walt Whitman and the American reaches of lands, ntountains and rivers. itlz According tc Halter Terry, ~oieFullar "sturttbled upon a way of dancinpt3 while Ruth St. Denis wvith nothing to Copt?

with hardly a clue revealed a new world of danceait14 These statemonts are most of ten reiterations from the dancers' autobiographies which, as we have seen, reveal. only partial truths. For example, how many timss in reading about these early --. dancers does one come across the asserticn that 'Mature* was a , constant source of influence and thsir guiding inspiration. Such an assertion, while conveying a general sense of the emotional attitudes of thess dancers, ne$ds to include a recognition that many of the sources for their naturalistic expression were derived from the theories of Dslsarte. Their use of natural S-J ' irnslqes developad, in part, from Delsartian teachers such as Ge~evieveStebbins, who used it as an implement for teaching

I this Americanized method of naturalistic gesture. - .-1 \ A11 three dancers, in their praisr? of ~atilralmovament, are known to have spoken against the stiff, unnatural posturing of ballet. It is unclear housvsr the degree to which thsir dance styles were a conscious re jsction of the ballet for&. For althonqh toe dancing existed in ~aericanpopular theatre, it could hardly be described as a dominant dance for@ at this time. In their formative years, ballet was simply not a part of the experiental background of either Puller, Duncan or St, Denis.

Puffer never studied ballet, whila Duncan and St. Dsnis are said to have taken only one or two classss--hardly a sufficient basis from which to devise a rebellious dance form. (, It is nut necassary to view the emergence of modernisa in '

/ dance entiraly in terms of a reaction against traditional balletic form. Nor should it be said that Fuller, Duncan and St, Denis were innovators whose inspirations came only fro@ nature or a well-spring ~ithiathemselves, We can modify both these views througb an understanding of the relationship between the choreoqraphic breakthroughs of these dancers and tha cultural milieu in vhich these dancs forms first appeared. And it is this undsrstanding vhich establishes fuller, Duncan and

St. Dealis as American dancers whoso major eazly influences came

fro@ the vaudeville staqe and popular theatre, ths physical \ cuiture ieovelaen.t, the a~pliedaeslthetics cf Delsarte and the neo-classical and exotic imagery in commercial art. , Prom such popular sources arose a number of core olantsnts which began to define the notion of dance in the twentieth century. Fuller, Duacan and St. Denis moved towards a simplicity of composition in vhich wvement beqan to emerge as the primary focus of dance, Until the beginning of the tventiath century vestern theatrical dance was an elaborate combination of dance, theatre, amsic and decor, Dance co-existed with these other arts, and Eurther~orecften depended upon them for the presentaticn of the spectacle as an integrated whole. ~sadora] Duncan, however, presented her dances in stage settinqs which a•’forded a minimum amount of dscor. A small, rectangular carpet -- - or blue curtains were usually her only props.' Loie Pull4r L> abandoned the use of theatrical gestures in dance and motivated her movement frm thl~ef feet of light on flowioq draperies.

Storyline was oftsn discarded in the short choreographed works of all of the early modern iiancers, The reduction of slerascts such as storyline, decor and theatrical gesture opened the door for increased smphasis oo the alement of movement. In this say the pioneers contributed to the beginnings of a navemeat towards the pure medium of dance which was realized half a century later in the oorks choraographed by Hsrce ~unaingham,

\ influenced by Harmonic Gymnastics, America's popular version of Delsartian aesthetics, these daacess established the torso as the inner source ifon which gestures were motivated.

Their suc~essionaland spiral movements were the beginnings of a centering in the torso which was later developed in the contraction and release technique of Hartha Graham and the fall and recovery of Doris Bumphrey. The dances of the early pion2ars were further characterized by a sense of inner sx~loratfonand discovery, a natural autqrowth of popularized thaories of Delsarte which had /' systematically connected inner thoughts and smotions to loutor ,,, movements, Isadcrra Duncan proclaiated the dancer as one whose body was *'a luminous inanifzstation of his soul.,.speakiny in movement out of hiaself and out of something grs;ater than all sefvesafl's Ruth St. Denis described dance as an winescapable --- / necessity to manifest in outward form that state of cons@iousness which has arttained a certain intensity of illuminationewle Such explorations of tha inner wcrld of man and its relationship to the cuter world were thematic inspirations in the later works of Martha Graham and Doris Humphrey, two proteges of Ruth St. Denis,

To Loie Fuller, famed for her syabolic representations of natural ob-jecis, the line of the body became less and less iaportant. The play of light on moving material with its fragile, living centre at times af together disappearinq, became the essence of her dance. The depersonalization of the dancing fiqure was a unique and important component of modernism upon ohfch Alw in Nikolais later based his multi-media theatrs of dancs and light.

With their wide range of inaqe, th9n3 and movement forms,

Loie Fuller, Isadora Duncan and Ruth St. Denis brcuqht about a reexamination of the boundaries defining dance. Their , \ assimilation of popular culturs trends opened up possibilities in the medium of dancs which had never before been considered, and created an ambience which encouraged further evolution of the art %or@. This expanded sense of the possibilitim sf dance, in fact, became one of the hallmarks of nodarnism with many cfioreoqsapbers seeking to create unique and diversified ~oveiwnt styles. From the roots of popular culture arose, ironically enough, a modernism in dance which, becaus-ii of its continual search for cfiarsograghic breakthrouqhs, has led many observers to view it as an 91itist and, in @any respects, an eso-teric art. Appendix f:

-Appendis & Dance Analyses of Serpentine, -Ip&aenia in Bulis and gadha ---chareographed b~:Loie Fuller ---danced &x: Loie Fuller --ausic a: Gillet, "Loin du BalM first performed at Casinc Theater, New Ycxk. COLUPlFj 3 COLUBN I: DANCE ANALYSIS OF: Verbal Description Bovement

I) Serpentine begins on a -flow of darkened stage, Loie Fuf lm long skirt is visible o~2yas an indis- is primary tinct form draped in flowing movement folds of cloth, Lifting her interest arms, which ara attached to -wocden rods the skirt he@, she unfolds extend the vast, shframerfng matlexial, * novsmeat of aaterial 2) As Loie manipulates her -carving arms, simultaneous1y (in, out of cur- E up), the cloth begins to vilinear, undulate carving swooping arabesque arabesque lines in space, At lines in the same time, using a small space peddling foot-step Loie -peddle advances (upstage) and re- step treats (downstaqe) 3 times,

3) Hsr central figure ection- -qoldea less now, Loie Fuller alter- chalice nates each arm sending the -curvilinear or material in higher, eanvei- lines in drirrkinq oping cascades, The curvi- space CUP Pinxar arcs dsscsnd and sweep out in a horizontal. pattarn; folds of cloth crossing inward si~ultan- eously before the outward suinq,

4) Then, peddling in a half -peddle turn, her arras held out hosi- stsp zontally and the draperies (112 rippling with a circular turn) 5) wrist-action, Loie Fuffer -back wards -opening arches into a kackbend, arch flcwer until %es head E upper tcrso -waltz 0s lily are completely visible. movem%nt

6) Risinq G turning, the -peddle draperies flcwing upward step thzough a Brief repetition oE (full the moving imagery, in which turn) COLUMN A COLUHN B COLUMN C DANCE ANALYSIS OF: Verbal Description PIovement Imaqe

wallarme envisioned a chalice G fire, Loie suddenly swings the -peddle skirt hem out into a 1arqe circle turns that undulates up E down as she peddfe-turns seven tiaas round.

7) A slow lateral arm lift -body main- -winged creates the fleeting image of tains low moth or a winged creature, that vanishes centre of butter- with the quick reiteration of gravity [even fly the firs G drinking goblet as draperies saotif s, grow higher)

8) The seething drapery con- -central -chalice tinues to grow vertically, figure -fire crossing and co~pletsly completely -cocuo11 swaddling the central figure disappears .. in draperias 9) until ir, a spectacular -total finale of colour, the release voiuminous, irridescea t skirt collapss,

* Tha black and white film, of course does not illustrat2 ths lighting spectacle so important to Serpentine. Beaudelaire, tha French symbolist poet, in a review recreates the flow of liqht and colour. "Suddenly a streaa of light issued apparently front the woman herself, while around her the folds of qauze rose and fell. in phosphorescent waves, which seemed to have assumed one knawns not how, a subtle materiality taking on the forlu of a qolden drinking cup, a magnificent lily, or a glistening moth wanderinq in obscurity, But all the time, bekueen the many shapes assumed by the drapery one divined the tremulous figuze of a wo~an," chorea rg&y &I: Xsadora Duncan -&p:-- Hortense Kooluris ---music bp: Christoph Hiilibald Gluck first performed at the KrystallwPa2ast, Berlin, Germany. COLU3M B COLUMN C DANCE ANALYSIS OF: Movement Ilrtage

I) BIB GAI 1) Hostanse Kooluris, clad -posture -Greek only in a filtny, knee-lsnqth frieze tunic stands stage righ-t, -bas relaxed, pet still in a pro- relief Eile, Tanaqran post are. Gracefully she snings into a skip stsp, step-backwing -simple step, step combination which skips travels hurizoratally across -swing to stage left, * BrDs gener- step or ally held cut lightly, side- low leg ways at shoulder height, she suing occasionally lifts the@ over- head with an upraised face.

2) A brief waltz-twirl stsp -waltz as described in Lesson No. lo, stel? Exercise 1 of f rma Duncan8s -similarity book ,T& Echniqpg Isadorg to peddle ---I)uncam--"take two steps to the step msn- right, starting with the right tionsd foot. On the third step raise in Serpen- yourself on the toes of the ---tine and riqht foot, while the left lag ---Radha is raised backward from the hip as high as possible,m**

3) Hortense returns to stage sight with a skip G a swinqstep -skips alonq the same horizontal path- and way, Then alternating har profilz svinq position to squarely face the steps audience, sfio again repats the skip, swinqstep, skip--adding -use of a half turn, her torso alter- torso nately overcurved, then up- lifted. She lifts her arms, hands hanging limply from the -successo wrist as she overcurves her ional arm back, then unf~fdsher arms movement as she arches her chest upward, -waltz Aqah, she repeats the waltz stap step. COLUM W A COLUflH B COLUWN C DANCE ANALYSIS OF: verbal Description Plovemsnt Image

4) with sirtall lilting swinqsteps, -maidsn she carves out a curved path as strewins if streving flowers over ths -waltz stage, Three skips, a waltz- step flowers twirl step and another skip out -panto- to the' audience pantomiming the aime tossing of petals over them.

5) Air Gai ends as it began, After 5 saall sunning steps to staqs left, Rortsase repeats -running the waltz-tnifl step, and a steps skip, step, step--backswing -waltz step, step horizontally to stage step -Tanaqran riqht where she resums her -pasture posture original pose, * For further axplanation of the skipping and backsuing steps, see f rirta Duncan, The TscRnisug gg Isadora Dumn, (New York: pp, 5-8. COLUHfU 0 COLUMN G DANCE ANALYSES OF: Verbal Description ~fovement Image I) Ai LENTO 1) From thls final. taaagran pose in && aa, Hortenss slowly lowers her arm as she turns and bsgins a slow, stately walk across the stage, Extendinq her arms out and up as if in offerinq to an un- known diety , her steps become lighter until she pauses in a final upward reach, Her arms pull in to the oriq- inal low offering position -arm move- and she repeats the extension laent em- upwards tuice noseowacross inatfng stags riqht, then diagonally, into and forward stage right. (Pause) out of solar plexus 2) Ex~cu~~A~a slov half turn so %-,hat her back is to ths audience, Hort anse drops her aruts, circles then and raises the left arm high overhead as she pauses in a deep lunge, face and chest arched upwards, -low centre Halkinq a few steps upstaqe, cen%ra still with her back to us, gravity she pauses once aore, standing -simply erect and tall, extendinq her standing left ara and face upward, in place

3) •’?%turningta the lorersd offering position, section 1, -slow -offering she aqain repeats the arm walk repeated extension out and upvard twice more as she slowly walks across to stage left, then diagonally, forward staqe left. {Pause) Suddenly, pulfinq away from the -quick upward reach she walks quickly aalk to centss stage and reiterates sac,+,ion 2 of & Lento, moving upstaqe, the only variation COLUPfPS A COLUBN B COLUMN il: DAHCE ANALYSIS Of: Verbal Descaiption Movement I ma ge beinq her use of the right am.

Y) Her final move~entsrepeat the offerinq of saction 1, and- inq once aqain in the beginninq -Titnagran posture, -post use posture

I11 g&I Repeated as in Part 1, --choreoqraphkd a: Ruth St, Denis --danced by: Ruth St, Denis ausic b~:Leo Delibes P First performd at the New York Theatre, New York, CDLUHEJ B COLUIPSN C DANCE ANALYSTS OF: Verbal ~escription flavement Smaqe

"When the curtain went up a - Par vast temple was shown encrusted eastern with qold and dim with srnoks.*** exoticism Radha sits in meditative silence - realism on an altar in centre stage clad of stage in a richly woven halter and settinq shorts, bejewelled with rings, bracelets and necklaces, The movemeat begins as two cogs - f emm of chanting priests file in, fatal. e bearf ng garlands, jewels, bells -brief, and a bovl. After a stylized alluring greeting, they kneel facing costume inwards; a demariation of the ritual. space, A drummer and chief priest enter and also kneel, the former at the side, the latter in front of the altar. Of fsrinq supplications to Radha, the chief priest corttplet-es COLUHH A COLUHN 3 COLUHN C DANCE ANALYSIS OF: Verbal Description tufovelitent Image

I) pig rnKEBIHG The idol, awakening, slowly -s-tat ufs -Yoga begins to breathe-- the c hssS posing, position rising and fallinq in rezponse, EY s s flutter, and-open, - Han ds unfofd, ksqinninq ths fir st of five hand-signs zesembling Eastern Indian synbolic qesture. This hand dance forms a motif, which is repaated, with variation, thsouqhout

1, Hands initiate openinq -East of the arm at chast level Indian 2, Finqess beconte delicately hand E expressive as the arm and ara torso move to a new position qesturss 3, The right leg unfolds and reaches downward during the third gesture. 4, Hands palms still tagether -ce remon- lower to chin level as if in ial prayer, prayer 5. Slowly the hands open under *ha chin to form a lotus blossom.

Finally the lotus closes and the idol resumes her original position-legs folded, hands and eyes lowered, Eyes openinq once" again, legs -pantomimic nnfoldinq, Badha steps forward greeting casvinq variaticns of Indian hand gestures in space, Reaching full heiqht, she pauses for a -archaic momnt (gesture 2) then, in an stylized -Eqyptian archaic stylized walk she steps walk frieze from the altar to greet each priest with a hand sign, COLUHN R COLUMN C DANCE ANALYSIS OF: Verbal ~escription flove~~ent Iinage The Dance sf the Senses is composed of four pasts ex- empli fying touch, sasll, hearing and taste, Each section beqins with a sharp drum beat follcwed by Ruth's stylized archaic walk ta the waiting. line of priests. Beaded amulets, garlands, -fascin- bells and a small bowl in- ation spire the msvment in these with the brief solos. senses

I1 The Dziacie of Touch Walking forward Ruth arcs one arn overhead and sets the other in apposition; quickly alter- nares her asBs twice and adds a turn in place. This mova- aent motif is repeated several times in The Dance -peddle -of --Touch, With a Pow lungs step staqe left, Ruth arches back tossing her head, turns twice -back and poses, arch -posture galking backwards she dis- plays her jewels with subtle -spiral arm and hand ratary move- nents, leading into two turns and a repetition of the af- tesnatiog arm aotif , ---Dance of Touc,h increasqs in tempo and reaches a climax -low with a low leg swing tc leg left and sight, two tums suing hand gestures, two more - ha nd turns and a final pose. gestures -posturs COLUPIN B COLUHN C DANCE ANALYSIS OF: Movement 1 ma ge \>

111 THE DANCE SHELL The Dance 22 Smell begins -posture -decors- in a decarativs pose; two tiva qarlands entwined around garlands Ruth9 s torso. Spacious turns along a hcrizontal line typify, and in fact commence the movement in this section, Followinq the first crossing, Ruth softly peddles back alonq the sane line while in- dulgently s~eliingthe 21s wers.

Aqain she whirls into the spacious crossf ng adding a low leg swinq at the end. Removing the garlands from around her neck while turn- ing in place, Euth wal ks with several low lag swings and once again spin$, tha jar- -1ei.j lands swinqing as extensions swing of arm. The last aovement phrase is repeated and ends in a sensuous pose, the garlands framing the gcd- dsss* face and falling in a lonq line across her body. COLUMN A COLUflN B COLUPJN C DANCE ANALYSIS OF2 Verbal Description Movement Image

XV ZffE sf SOUND A series of ~osssand quick ara qestires set the -series of structure in the Dance 4 poses --of ---Sound. Small bells -QeStUZr3S fastened to her fiogers (hand) send tra~orsthrough anthqs body, particularly notice- able in each of the four postures. Ruth rises and sinks -low with small vibrations center initiated by the bells, of gsav- Arms continuing aove- ity, es- sent down, lift over her pecially Read into the temple gestura noticaa- --followed by a single ble in turn, low leg kick into a this second pose, dance af poses

Hand gestures siiri- ilar to those in "The Wwakaninq" rest in a third posture.

Quick arm changes, -torso, 2 curved, 2 angular very lead into a peddle curved step to centre stage -centre of where Ruth strikes a gravity final pose, low -peddling stap

Y gm DANCE t]F TASTE (not filesd) COLUBN B COLUMN C CANCE ANALYSIS OF: Ver Oal Description Movement

VI DELIRIUM a gESEH3ES Ruth again reitgrates vari- ations of her Indian hand -arm and East signs as a priest fastens hand Indian bells to her ankles and qest ures costunte wraps a gold skirt around and her waist. Draping the qes-turss folds over her shoulders in res2~blanceof a sari, -swaying of she slowly sways to the body on centre of the stage and balls cf sf n ks to the f Poor in a the feet sensuous sitting position,

Delicate kisses to the - sen SUO U S- hands, caresses along the Tless arw, gestures of sleep and - f mine lotus blossoms moving down f atala fro& the face to outline -lotus womanly curves, form the blossom moveaents of this floor section. After two repe- titions, Buth leans for- ward, kisses her fingers and rises.

A delirium of the senses -peddlinq -nautch beqins with sari11 radial step dance turns which alternate clockwise and counter- -spirals clockwise increasinq in of the speed until Ruth is upper spinninq continually in torso one direction. Each turn -centre of is initiated with a torso gravity spiral; the arm Tolfouinq low in rezponso.

B brief posture (stage left) , a molaent of bal- anced equilibriu~,and Ruth is spinning across the. stags in a horizontal lines, only to return COLUMM B COLUMM C DANCE ANALYSIS OF: Verbal Description Plovemznt I ma ge

again, A backward arch, -back head thrown high culmin- arch ates each spatial crossing,

The radial. turning in centre stage resumes, climaxinq with the addi- tion of: -SUCCOSS- a) arm ripples ional b) hold ing and li lft ing movemer t the edges of the of the flowing skirt arms c) undulatiasl of the -use of skirt hem, while skirt as spinning. extension -nautch of body dance and movs- ment Finally, with a flour- -back ishing lift of her skirt, fall the circling ends abrupt- -complete ly, and Radha falls back- relaxa- wards to the floor, in a tio:i state of dalirum.

VT.1 FAREWELL AND BETPRN TO --THE ---THRONE- Ruth rises to her knees, arranq ing her disarrayed skirt, In a ~eriasof gestures she: a) undoes her skirt and lets it fall about her knees, b) raises her arfas to the prayer position. c) rises, arms opening then retracting into the centre of her torso d) repeats the prayer gesture openiaq to a lotus e) and finally reiterates .the bowl aotif, as she steps out of the skist and walks backwards, COLUMN a COLUHR c DANCE ANALYSIS OF: Verbal Description Movement 1mag63 Stepping up to the altar, Radha offers her bowl-like hands to the priests and audience, sweeping her arms out, then up over her head. As she sits on the altar resuminq her oriqinal position, ths priests and goddess lift the prayer gesture over head and down to torso level, Notes -- Chapter 1

Hargaret Lloyd, The 3orzoi Book qf Eloder~,Dance (New Ksrk: Dance Horizor,s, Xnc, , f 349), p. 3,

Isadcsra Duncan, Ply LiE9 f (1942) Black and Gold,, rev,, Nt3w York: Liveright ~ublishingCorps, 1927 j, p. 9.

Olqa Maynard, &er ican flodern Dance; TJ! Pionesr_s (Boston: Little, Brown and CO.. 1'365) * p. 10. galtar Terry, Dance &g &gerica [3d. ed,, rev,; New Pork, Harper and Row Publlrshers, 135-fj7 p. 39.

Suzanne Shelton, "The 1 nfluence of Genevieve Stebbins an the ~arlyCareer of Ruth St, Denistt, Dance Besearch Annual, 1 X (1978), 33,

Waste nacdonald, afsadrrra Re-examined: Lesser Known Aspects of the Great Dancers Life,'* Dance Haqazine, July (3977), 55. Notes -- Chapter 2 < Hope T. Eldridge, Dorthy Swain Thomas, P~~glation ~edistributionand Economic Growth in States ------7---- Unftd ----A1870- 1950 III [Philadelphia: The Aaerican Philosophical Society, 1964), p, 194-200.

Albert F, MacLean, Jr., Antsrican Baudevill~sas Ritual (Kentucky: University of Kentucky Press, l965), p, 2.

Russell Zynes, x& Tasteaakars {New York: Harper and Brothass, fnc,, 1955), p. 5,

Robert C, Toll, Blackinq s~ Minstre& Show in Nineteenth --Cent= Ameri~g (Hew York: Oxford University Press, 1.3741, p. 4,

Norman F, Cantor and Micha~lS, Berthman, eds. ,T& Historv of of Popular Cultura (New York: The ~acl~lillanCo., 1'368). p, 452,

Russell. Eye, New Dimensions Populaz Culturq (~owlinq Green, ~hxo;Bowling Green Universxty Popular Press, f972), p* 59.

Bernard Rosenberg and David Manning Hhite, eds. Piass ,,-aCufture- ,-The Popular Asts America (New York: The Free Press, 1957), p. Y7.

Ruth St, Dsnis, & _Unfinished Life; & Autobioqraghy: [New York: Dance Horizons, Inc., 1939) , p, 581,

H,E, cooper, *A cycle of Dance Crazes," Dance ~aqazine, February (1927). 23,

10. Prank Luther Mott, Bistory pf Anterican flaqatines 4Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1938) , p. 5,

11, Hellrttut Lehmann-Haupt, The Book irn America; A His&_ory_o_f the --aak& and SeUinq Of ~00'17s~~~ii3:tX~tates-(23. eF ., rev, ; New York, 8,R. Bovker Co,, 1939), p, 201.

12, frank Luther Elott, $qlden Mu3.tftudes; 32 Story pf Best Sellers United (Mew Yark: R,R. Co, 1947) ---- -in ------a-states Bonker , , pe 207. 17. Victoria Case and Robart 0, Case, Called &_t Cultugm; fie Story gf Shautauqw (New York: Books for Libraries Press, 1908) , PO 18.

13. Case and Case, p. 11. Nates -- Chapter 3

Allen Churchill, Tbe Grsat White Hay; A Recreation of Broadway's Goidan Era of Theatrical Entertainment {Hew York: E,P, Dutton and CO., Inca, 1962), p, 206,

St. Denis, & Unfinished Life p. 21.

Duncan, Jy &ifp p. 27,

Joe Laurie, ~r,, Vaudeville: fro& Honk Tonks & the Palace (New York: Benr y.~~~ana~o;;i9e'4~i.

Ruth St, Denis Scraptook and ~lippinqs(1915). "A Bars-Leggsd Dancer," The Gi-obe and Commerical ~dvsrtiser, Dance Collections, He% York Public Library,

Ruth St, Denis Scrapbook and Clippings (l9l5), IqBrinqing Temple Dance fro@ the Orient to Broadway," New York "Times, ----aarch 25, 1906, Dance Collections, Nsn York Public Library. fraa Duncan, The Technig~of fsadgra Duncan as Ta_~ht&y -Irma ----Duncan (2d. ed,, rev.; New York, Dance Horizons, Inc., 1970)e pa 22.

Duncan, The Techniques of fsadorg Dufican, p, 23,

Hark E. Peruginf, *'Skirt Dalacinq; Its Place in Dance History,)' Dancinq Times, February ( 19Y5) , 2,

Ruth St, Denis, "The Goddess Badha Speaks," Broadwax -Haqazinrg, p. 66. John Ernest Crawford Flitch, Modern Damcinq Dancers (Philadelphia: 3.0. Lippincott Co,, 1312). p, 34.

Sally Somiwt, "L~ieFuller,** The Drama Beview; Post-Modern ----Dance ----Issue, 19, Wo. I (1975)7-367-- Loie Fuller, Fiftesn .@Ye ictf a X>ancerts Life (Boston: Saall, Maynard and Co., 39 13) . p. 34, Flitch, p. 85.

Carl Van Vechten, Y!erpsichorean Souvenirs,** fiaericqg ~ancsy' -----Dance gaqazdng, 33 f7357), p. 36, Peruqf nf, F. 202. 17, Ruth St, Denis Scrapbook and Clippinqs {l315), n3ringinq Temple Dance frcm the Orient to Broadwaytw N?_w York 'T11nes~ ----March XA 1906, Dance collectiocs, Wss York Public Library,' 18, Douglas ~ilbert,American Vaudevi1l.e; as Life and Timas (2d, sd,, rev, ; Mew York, Dover Publications, Inc., 1'353),

19, Russell Nya, The Unmbarrass@ Huse: x& Popular Arts &g -----Anterica [New York: The Dial Press, l9?Oj, p, 173, 20, ~arrtlenci-taClippings, Hew York Tines, april & 1832, Diznca Collections, New Yak Public Library.

21, Ruth St, Denis scrapbook and Clippings (1915), t4Proctorgs Theatres Again Lead in Novelty," Teleqraph, Pebzuar~& ---1906, Dancs collections, Wen Pork Public Library, 22, Ruth St. Dsnis Scrapbook and Clippinqs (1315), lSAa Interpretation of Religion in Dancing," Current Literature; Religion and Ethics, Dance coSlections, New York Public Library,

23, Euth St, Denis Scrapbook and Clippinqs f 1315) , J4Proctor's Theatres Again Leads in Wovelzy,* Teleqra~f?, Pqbruary lL --1 906, Dancs Colleceions, Neu York Public Library. 2Y. Lincolu Klrsten, Dance: 4 Shark H~S~OTYof Classis Theatrig& Danciw (3d. ed,, rsv.; New York, dance Horizons, Inc., l3&7), p. 351,

25, St, Deais, Unfinisheg _Lk_f2, p, 55,

27, Toll, p, 184,

29, Victory Seroff, !I!,lr?l Real lsadora (London: Hutchinson and CO, , 3972) , 42 Motes -- Chapter 4

Genevieve Stebbins, *"he Rdati-snship of physical Culture to ExpressicnVrrWqrner" s PIagazi~_e,20 ( l8W), 98.

Olga Maynard, **In Homage to Francsis Delsar-te 1811-1871," ---Dance Haqazin9, Auqust (1373), 64. Ruth St, Dsais Scrapbook and Clippings (7315) , "Brinqinq Tsfepie Dance from the Orisnt to Broadway," New York lintes, fiarch 1306, Collections, Hork Public - .--A25 _.- Dance Mew Library.

St, Denis, & unfinished Life, p. 31.

St, Deais, Uoffnished Life, p. 8.

Halter Terry, An Interview with Ted Shawn on Francoif Delsarte, 7-120, phonotapa, lew Y ork City Public Library, 1973,

Deidze Priddin, The Art c?f Dance French Literature {londofi: Adaat and Charles Black Ltd., l352), F. 7Y.

Joseph E. Harks III, America Learns .trp (New Pork: ~xpositicaUniversity Press, 1357), p. 38,

30, Stebbins, The Relakicnship of Physical Culture to Express~,p, 99.

31, Isadora Duncan, The Art of ths Dance (Mew York: Theatre Arts, Inc,, 1328c-~7337

12, St, Denis, & Unfinished Life, p. 17.

13, St, Denis, Unfinished Life, p. 36.

14, ~rifncisStesgmuller, ;our Isadora, The Love Stcry of Isadora ---Duncan --and ----Gordon --Craq (Mew Pork: Bandom House, Inc,, 1974), p, 363,

15, IsadorawsScrapbook and Clippinqs ('1309- 1328) , **Great Life-Rhythms Pulse Through Body," Dance Collections, Hsw York Public Library, 16, Allan Roes McDougall, Isado~a, 11 Rqvo3,utionary &g Art 2nd ---Love (Mew York: Thomas Helson and Sons, Ltd,, 1960)Tp. 31, 17, Duncan, a &&fe,p. 38,

20, St. Denis, 42 unfinished Life, p. 36.

21, B. W, Grant, Grecian Picture Dance 22 Drean of Ancient _GD2eCe {Buffalo: The Two Step Publishinq Go., 1893y5 p. 4, System ----Dramatic

24, St. Denis, Unfin$shed Lifs, p. 6,

26, Stebbins, Dalsarte's System a Dramatic Bxpression, p, 230.

27, Stebbins, Relatioashi~f Physical. Culture .tr, Expressio~,p, 95,

28, Ruth St. Denis Scrapbook and Clippings (1915) , ciBringing Ths Temple Dance frora the Orient to Broadway," York TimesL March 25 1906, Collections New Hork Public Zikrary. P-2 -- Dance 29, Stebbins, ------Relation ----Culfura 96s

31, Huqo van tlofaamnstahl, "Her Extraordinary 1mmodiac y," Dance Elaqazine, XLII, No, 9, f1968), p. 38.

32, Don McDonagh, The Complete Guide to Hodern Dance {New York: Doubleday and Company, fnc,, 1576), p. 9. Notes -- Chapter 5

1. llargaret Cogswell, ed,, Tfie American gostex (Ntu Itork: The American Federation cf Arts, October House Inc,, 1367), p. 12.

5, St, Denis, & Unfinished Life, p, 52. 6 Ruth St. Denis, Scrapbook and Clippings (191 5) , The Liter= @&3&, Dance Cof lections, Neu Pork Public Library.

7, Talbot Hai~lin, Greek ievivaf Architecture in America (New York: Doves Publications, Fnc., 19&4), p, 23-24.

8. Yictos Seroff, The Real lsadora [London: Hutchinson and Co., 1372) g pa 550

9, Lois Bather, Lovely Isador3 (Oakland California: Ths Rather Prass, l976), p. 36, 10. Stella Hazy Newton, Hea&iL 4~ g@ Reason (Great, Britain: Cox and Hymn Ltd, , 1974) , p, 3Y, Motes -- Chapter 6

1, D~idre ridd din, 'fhq 22 Dance French Litsraturj (London: A. and C. Black, Ltd., 13521, p. 61.

2, Pridden, p. 75.

3. Pridden, p. 61.

4, Pridden, pa 62.

5. Prank Kermode, "Poet and Dancer Before DiaghilsvPt* ---Salma_qundiI 33 (39715), p. 28. 6, Puller, pa IX,

7. Fuller, p. 127.

8. Paul Plaqriel, rsd,, Isadora Duncan (Neln' Ysrk: Henry Holt and Co,, 1363), p. 44,

9, St, Denis, unfinished &ife8 pa 30.

10. Havelock Ellis, gl%_e Dance of Life [New York: Houqhton Bilifflin Co., 1923), p. 65,

I 1. Walter Sorell, ffhe Dance Throuqh The Aaes [New York: Grossnet and ~uaEp,Inc,, l967), p. 378,

12, ainthrop Pal~sr,xhsatricaf Dancinq 2. A~meri._c_a (Men York: A.S. Barnes and Ca., 1978), p. 29. Bibliography

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