Throwback Thursday and Mary Wigman
Born Marie Weigmann in Germany on
November 13, 1886, Mary Wigman didn’t begin formal dance training until she was
24. She studied with Emile Jacques-Dalcroze and Rudolf Laban. She soon
choreographed her first solo, Witch
Dance. This piece exhibits elements that would define her unique – some would
say bizarre – style. Her obituary in the New York Times states: “The German critics who re viewed Mary
Wigman's first dance compositions in 1919 called them “ridiculous,” “idi otic,”
“a mad frenzy” and “an imbecilic dislocation of the joints.” They called her
pro grams “unbearably fatiguing.”
But Wigman persevered. She believed
dance could be performed without music and didn’t have to be pretty. It could,
in fact, be ugly. According to https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2013/may/22/mary-wigman-german-modern-dance-pioneer:
“Wigman aimed for state of ritualised
trance as she danced”.
Her students were many, including Yvonne
Georgi, Margarethe Wallmann and Hanya Holm. Wigman was a major force in the
development of modern dance and her influence can be seen in the works of such
notables as Martha Graham and others.
During the 1930s Wigman and her company
toured the United States, and in 1931 she established the Wigman School in New
York City. In 1936 it became the Hanya Holm School. Wigman’s choreographic
works include The Seven Dances of Life (1918), Totenmal (1930),
Orpheus and Eurydice (1947), and many others.
In her early eighties, Wigman broke her
thigh and never really recovered. She died three years later on September 18,
1973. She was 86.
From the Big
Blue Book of Ballet Secrets
Dance History Factoid #140:
“Mary Wigman was a modern dancer pioneer whose first
dance was the Witch Dance.”
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