Isadora Duncan (May 27, 1877 — September 14, 1927) was a dancer, considered by many to be the creator of modern dance. Born in the United States, she lived in Western Europe and the Soviet Union from the age of 22 until her death at age 50. In the United States she was popular only in New York, and only later in her life. She performed to acclaim throughout Europe.
She rejected traditional ballet steps to stress improvisation, emotion and the human form. Duncan believed that classical ballet, with its strict rules of posture and formation, was "ugly and against nature"; she gained a wide following that allowed her to set up a school to teach.
Duncan became so famous that she inspired artists and authors to create sculpture, jewelry, poetry, novels, photographs, watercolors, prints and paintings of her.
Throughout her career Duncan did not like the commercial aspects of public performance, regarding touring, contracts and other practicalities as distractions from her real mission: the creation of beauty and the education of the young. A gifted, if unconventional pedagogue, she was the founder of three schools dedicated to teaching her dance philosophy to groups of young girls (a brief effort to include boys was unsuccessful). The first, in Grunewald, Germany, gave rise to her most celebrated troupe of pupils, dubbed the Isadorables, who took her surname and subsequently performed both with Duncan and independently.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isadora_Duncan
Duncan also danced barefoot, to rebel against the styles of ballet, and also as she felt contact with the earth was vital in her style of movement, using the body as the instrument. She was thought to be one of the pioneers of modern dance and introduced it to others, for example her group the isadorables who performed with her and also on their own. she didnt just inspire her pupils; also artists, sculptures, jewellary, poetry and much more.
ReplyDelete