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PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS OF DANCE CRITICISM

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION: PHILOSOPHY AND DANCE CRITICISM

by Julie Charlotte Van Camp

Copyright Julie Charlotte Van Camp 1981

All Rights Reserved

NOTE: This dissertation may be downloaded, saved, printed, and reproduced for personal, educational, and scholarly uses, but only if this complete permissions notice and the full copyright notice are included with any such uses. This dissertation may not be sold or otherwise used for commercial purposes. For commercial use, please contact the author.

The page numbers from the original dissertation are included in the text here as follows: /p. x.

Endnotes from the original dissertation are included in the text here as follows: (x)

Aestheticians have typically ignored the problems of dance criticism, or given them only the most cursory treatment, which is understandable, given the complexity of dance. (1) A performing art, it involves not only human movement, but also music, scenery, lighting, costumes, acting, plots, and even, in some experimental works, poetry-reading and videotapes. Only recently have any philosophers attempted full-length analytical works of dance, although some have claimed that certain comprehensive aesthetic theories also apply to dance and others have commented briefly on dance in discussions of other artforms.

As the philosophy of dance criticism is largely undeveloped, it would be premature to attempt a comprehensive theory here. Nor is this intended as a survey of dance, the history of dance, or dance criticism. These areas provide a wealth of important examples for the issues to be discussed, but they do not constitute, in themselves, philosophical discourse or analysis.

Among the many unexamined philosophical issues in dance, some of the most difficult and important involve evaluation. What is the meaning of "good" as used to evaluate dance? Are

there objective, ultimate principles justifying judgments of aesthetic value? What are those principles, and how are they justified? How are specific critical reasons related to and supported by these ultimate principles and by a work of art itself? Before these questions can be properly explored, however, more preliminary issues must be addressed concerning the object of criticism.

This dissertation identifies several of these philosophical problems concerning the object of criticism in dance, many suggested or implied, although not always systematically examined, by aestheticians, historians, theoreticians, and critics of dance. They are important problems, in part because they involve special characteristics of dance not shared by such major artforms as painting, music, and theater, and thus are less likely to have been addressed adequately by aesthetic (2) theories explaining other artforms. The problems here should also provide additional perspective and challenges to the development of a better understanding of the arts generally.

A. Philosophical Work on Dance: Why So Little Has Been Done

The existence of a dearth of philosophical work on dance is beyond dispute, but there is disagreement over the explanation for the shortage, and even its undesireability, with the blame spread generously among philosophers and dance-world alike.

Since philosophy involves analysis of other things, one

simple explanation is the near-absence of a subject. Despite the long history of dance in religious and social rituals, its emergence as an artform is fairly recent, and its acceptance as anything other than an esoteric obsession of a small cult occurred only within recent decades. (3)

Even after emerging as an artform, dance has changed so continuously and rapidly that the very identification of the object of study remains difficult. (4) Dance is also unusually complex, compared with the simpler, "purer" artforms of painting and music. Dance is an "impure" mixture of unequal parts, of unclear relative importance, of human movement, music, theater, acting, mime, and the visual dimensions provided by scenery and costuming. (5)

The non-verbal nature of dance also contributes to the difficulty of articulating even its elementary characteristics, (6) as does its ephemeral existence for only brief periods of time, (7) usually unrecorded for further study.

Other artforms, most notably music, are also non-verbal and ephemeral. Theoretical writing on dance, however, has also suffered from a fundamental anti-intellectualism that has infected many artists and writers in dance. Philosopher Curtis Carter blames those ". . . dancers, writers, and educators who separate sensibility from intelligence, . . ." and misleadingly characterize dance as an art of sensibility along. (8) Carter suggests that the ". . . principal source of confusion in the understanding of dance" is "the mistaken assumption that abstractions do not apply to dance." (9) Selma

Jeanne Cohen, a dance historian and theoretician, also criticizes dance practitioners for their skepticism of scholarship. (10)

This anti-intellectualism can be explained, in part, by the dance-world's defensiveness against Puritanical attitudes prevalent in Western culture. As suggested by critic Marcia B. Siegel: ". . . dancers suffer a heritage of conflict, between the primal, total expressiveness of which their art is capable and the puritanical attitudes that society has clamped on it for hundreds of years." (11) Philosophers in particular have been charged by their colleague, David Michael Levin, with misunderstanding the human body and denying "the reality of the body's sensuous presence," which, in turn, explains their lack of interest in dance: "If philosophers cannot even develop an adequate account of the human body, how can they be expected to say anything true and interesting about dance?" (12) The human body is involved either as an instrument or an object of representation in such artforms as opera, theater, sculpture, and painting, which have received more attention from philosophers. Dance alone, however, uses the living, moving body in performance as the primary instrument of the artform, giving plausibility to the charge of philosophical Puritanism. But it is clearly unfair to blame only philosophers for the underdevelopment of dance philosophy, in view of the obstacles amply provided by the dance community and the nature of the artform itself.

For the few writers and scholars defying these discouragements, limited research materials and methodologies present practical obstacles. Until recently, with the growth of the Dance Collection of the New York Public Library, source material was very scarce and inaccessible. (13) Even now, the valuable resource of film and videotapes of actual performances are often non-existent or unavailable to the scholar because of viewing restrictions imposed by choreographers. (14) Dance works of previous centuries are even more inaccessible because they were preserved, if at all, in crude notational systems, written notes, and sketches, (15) and the memories of dancers. Limited opportunities for advanced study of the theoretical aspects of dance have also contributed to the dearth of scholarship. (16)

These problems have hindered dance scholars of all kinds, the historian and theoretician, along with the philosopher. But the philosopher has had an additional hurdle, the late development in philosophy of aesthetics as an analytic discipline. Until recently, aesthetics was usually pursued, if at all, as a minor divertissement from the serious business of ethics, epistemology, and metaphysics. (17) Although dance historians described and analyzed movement, they too failed to systematically address the philosophical questions of the nature of "beauty" in dance, what dance is, and how critical judgments are justified. (18)

Only in the last few decades have aestheticians made a systematic effort to apply the analytical tools of twentieth-

century philosophy to the problems of art and art criticism. (19) Even though philosophers as early as Plato and Aristotle mused briefly on beauty and the arts, contemporary philosophy is still identifying basic questions and formulating basic principles of aesthetics. Specific analyses of individual artforms have, quite properly, lagged behind the more rudimentary development of the field. While a discipline is still trying to master the intellectual equivalent of a demi-plié, it is not expected to attempt double assemblé turns.

Especially for those aestheticians who consider the proper domain of aesthetics to be the analysis of art criticism, philosophical work on dance has also been hampered by a dearth of dance criticism. (20) Traditionally, choreographic art has not been widely recognized as an important subject of criticism. (21) Only recently has there been a significant number of major dance critics. (22)

The dearth of philosophical work on dance thus results from many factors, including the recent development of the artform and criticism of the artform; the complexities of dance, especially its non-verbal, ephemeral, and mixed nature; the anti-intellectualism of practitioners and the puritanism of intellectuals; and the late development of philosophical aesthetics.

B. Philosophical Problems of Dance Criticism

Most writing on dance has not been philosophical: the history of dance, the biographies of dancers, evaluation and

description of dancers' performances and choreographers' creations, technical discussions of dance technique and the mechanics of production, and the sociological and ethnological context of dance. These theoretical areas might, of course, be the subject matter - the raw data - of philosophical inquiry.

This is not to say that academic philosophers have exclusive jurisdiction over philosophical thought. Glimmers of philosophical insight can be culled from the writings of choreographers, dancers, critics, and devotees, in their much broader articulation and conceptualization of dance. Professional philosophers are more likely to produce comprehensive, systematic examinations of philosophical issues, and to identify and analyze philosophical insights in the writings of others, (23) but who is or is not a "professional philosopher" is a different question from what makes an issue philosophical.

Philosophical issues of dance initially can be identified and categorized according to traditional subject areas of philosopher. Metaphysical issues include the ontological status of dance. Is a dance solely the physical bodies of the dancers, moving in time and space, at a particular performance? Is a dance the total of all bodies that have ever performed the dance? the choreographer's mental concept of the choreographic design? the written notation for the choreography? the perceptions and thoughts of the audience? the collection of all perceptions of all audiences who have ever

seen a performance of the work?

Another metaphysical issue is the identity of a dance. How is a performance identified as Giselle, and not Swan Lake? What are the criteria by which such an identification is made? Is it the familiar music? If the original score has been re-arranged, with new sections added at a later time, is the ballet still Giselle? What if a familiar production of Giselle were altered solely by substituting the score for Swan Lake in place of Adams' traditional music? Would this still be a performance of Giselle? Would it be Swan Lake? Is identity determined by the well-known plot and characters? If the ending of the Swan Lake plot were changed, would that performance still be Swan Lake? What aspects of a ballet simply cannot be changed without changing its identity as Ballet X?

Epistemological issues include whether audiences learn anything from watching dance. Do they acquire knowledge in some verbal or non-verbal sense? Does dance have meaning? What are "knowledge" and "meaning" in the context of dance? Are dance movements symbolic? Do they represent things? Do dancers express things? What do spectators perceive when they watch dance, merely bodies in motion, or movement somehow invested with additional meaning?

A very different approach to philosophy that has had some appeal to writers on dance is a phenomenological approach of describing the "perceptually visible," the "surface" phenomenon, both that of the experience of dancing and

of the visual perception of dance. (24) Seymour Kleinman characterizes phenomenology as

. . . a descriptive approach to experience which attempts to capture the meaning and significance of an act, a behavior, an art object, or in fact anything or anybody encountered in the "life-world." The major tenet is "return to the things themselves." Go directly to the experience and take it for what it is. (25)

Although this approach has enjoyed a certain popularity and is a useful reminder of the importance of perceptual qualities, it rejects the additional insights possible from theoretical, analytic work on other cognitive and evaluative dimensions of dance and will not be considered in detail in the following chapters.

More philosophically-inclined dance theorists, critics, and historians have been especially preoccupied with phenomenology and the work of Susanne K. Langer, while philosophers have tended to simply include dance as an afterthought in more comprehensive theories. Nor has anyone attempted to systematically identify and study certain foundations of philosophical analysis of dance. Gertrude Lippincott's 1949 sketch of aesthetic areas needing study is limited to: (1) the underlying principles of modern, "expressional" dance, (2) the relationship of dance to the broader context of politics, morals, and religion, (3) "the problem of literal representation or imitation and the relation of art to nature," and (4) "'the problem of making a match between an emotional experience and a form that has been conceived but not created,'" that is, analysis of "the creative impulse

and process." (26) Only the third area is of obvious and important interest to analytic philosophy. The first is an issue of dance theory, but not clearly philosophy. The second concerns the sociology of dance, and the fourth, the psychology of dance.

Other literature discussed here has addressed a miscellany of topics which do not coalesce into any foundation for an eventual comprehensive theory. For example, Wilfred A. Hofmann, noting the "relative immaturity of dance aesthetics," focused in 1973 on evaluative issues: "Are there objectively beautiful movements? which movements are considered beautiful? Why?" (27) But after briefly surveying historical uses of the concept of beauty, he turns to "the inductive, empirical method" to identify "which movement phenomena call up that pleasure which characterizes aesthetic enjoyment," (28) concluding "that beautiful movement is organically compatible, functional, clear, well-proportioned, and dynamic." (29) His analysis is ultimately less philosophical than personal and descriptive.

The philosophical issues of dance addressed in this dissertation concern the object of criticism and are basic to further philosophical analysis, especially because they involve unusual features of dance which might render philosophical work regarding other artforms suspect or less than obviously valid when applied to dance. The problems are as follows:

What is dance? (Ch. II). - Attempts to define dance

stake out a domain of human enterprise within which the critic works, along with psychologists, historians, philosophers, and other theorists of dance. Once this domain is identified, further analyses can proceed to identify more specific types and methodologies of discourse. A prerequisite to philosophical analysis of dance is an understanding of the artform itself, developed in part by examining possible definitions of "dance" for adequacy. Does dance possess distinctive features which set it apart from other artforms and other human activities? What theories and assumptions about normative, metaphysical, and epistemological issues are stated or implied in definitions proposed by various writers? What characteristics of dance are of special significance to other philosophical issues? The development of definitions has also been an important part of the reasoning in dance criticism. They are offered not merely as descriptions of what dance is, but of what dance and dance performances ought to be. Even if definition is ultimately not possible, the attempt provides important understanding of the concept examined.

What is the philosophical significance of the multiple media of dance? (Ch. III). - An unusual and important characteristic of dance, its use of several different artistic media, has special significance for the ontological status and the evaluation of dance performances. What is the nature of the existence of the thing being evaluated? What is the relative importance of each medium in the overall assessment

of the dance performance? Should critics evaluate the music, scenery, and costumes which are often part of a dance program? What is the significance of whether dance is an autonomous art or only an impure mixture of other pure artforms?

How is the identity of a work of art in dance established? (Ch. IV). - what is the work that is the object of criticism? How do critics evaluate what is shown in a dance program with regard to the work claimed to be shown? Identity theories relying exclusively on notational systems fail to explain identity in dance, consistently with actual practices, in part because of the liberal tolerance for variation in dance, the multiple media of the artform, and the use as the dance instrument of unique human bodies.

What is the proper object of criticism in dance, especially given the important role of production factors not perceivable in dance performances? (Ch. V). - The use for evaluation of information external to perceivable performances, especially information about creative processes and production factors, is common in actual practice by dance critics, but problematic for an anti-geneticist theory of aesthetic value restricting the proper aesthetic object to perceivable aspects of a performance.

In addressing these questions, philosophical analysis must explain the artform as it is actually practiced, appreciated, and evaluated. Consistency with philosophical theories regarding other artforms is important, but less so than explanatory adequacy. One reason why philosophical comment

on dance has sometimes been inadequate may be a reversal of these priorities. It is possible and to be hoped that much that philosophers have said about other artforms applies to dance, but this should be shown, not presumed. The unusual characteristics of dance, especially its multiple media and its use of the unique human body as instrument, may necessitate rejection of some philosophical theories attractive in explaining other artforms and new analysis in view of the characteristics of the artform of dance.

NOTES

(1) Unless otherwise stated, the use of the term "dance" will refer to the artform of dance, as opposed to recreational, ritualistic, or social dancing. Further, although some writers use the term 'ballet" to include all genres of the artform of dance, I will not follow that practice because of the narrower connotation of "ballet" as "classical dance" often understood today. Return to text

(2) "Aesthetics" is used here in the broad sense described by John Hospers as ". . . the branch of philosophy that is concerned with the analysis of concepts and the solution of problems that arise when one contemplates aesthetic objects;" in contrast, "philosophy of art covers a somewhat narrower area . . . , since it is concerned only with the concepts and problems that arise in connections with works of art and excludes, for example, that aesthetic experience of nature." "Problems of Aesthetics," The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 1967, I, 35-6.

The Oxford English Dictionary (1971) traces the history of the word from its use in Germany in the eighteenth century by Baumgarten as "'criticism of taste' considered as a science or philosophy," a use criticized by Kant, who preferred the more ancient sense of aesthetics as "'the science which treats of the conditions of sensuous perception.'" "Aesthetic," Vol. I, 147.

"Aesthetics" is sometimes used in dance writings to refer to any theoretical writing about art, or, sometimes, the collection of all theories about what art is and ought to be, but these uses seem unduly broad. On the other hand, the narrower sense of "aesthetics" as the philosophy of metacriticism does not yet enjoy universal acceptance. Return to text

(3) Critic Marcia Siegel points out the very short history of classical ballet: "The ballet repertory as handed down in the accepted oral-visual tradition dates back only La Fille Mal Gardee (1789), . . . it would be as if our music had started with Beethoven." "Waiting for the Past to Begin," in Growth of Dance in America, ed. By Edward Kamarck (Madison, Wisconsin: Arts in Society, 1973), p. 233.

Gertrude Lippincott cites, as one reason for the lack of interest by philosophers, the fact that dance ". . . has been considered a serious form of art for a relatively short period of time." "A Dancer's Note to Aestheticians," JAAC, VIII (1949), 98. Lippincott also details the interest in this country in the artform for the last several centuries. Return to text

(4) ". . . of all the arts dance has most successfully evaded extended scholarly and philosophical scrutiny by its unwillingness to stand still long enough to be examined."

Selma Jeanne Cohen, "Review: Dance Index," JAAC, XXX (Summer, 1972), 555. Return to text

(5) Louis Arnaud Reid characterizes "musical dancing" as one of the most "impure," "very mixed" arts, in that it appeals to more than one of the senses. Only "song and Opera" are more complex, to the point of being "compound," according to Reid's analysis. "A Criticism of Art as Form," in Introductory Readings in Aesthetics, ed. By John Hospers (New York: The Free Press, 1969), pp. 115-16.

Similarly, Virgil C. Aldrich has said: "Dancing is usually done to music, and is then an impure art, a mixture of two arts. Perhaps dancing is a minor art, as a hybrid between sculpture and music." Philosophy of Art (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1963), p. 66.

This complexity has resulted in an absence of "an independent identity" for dance, which has contributed to the lack of interest in theoretical writing: ". . . it has been considered an adjunct of other arts like music and drama, or as a part of physical education, rather than as an entity in its own right." Curtis L. Carter, "Intelligence and Sensibility in the Dance," in Growth of Dance in America, p. 213. Return to text

(6) Andre Levinson observes: "Nothing is more difficult than to reduce the essential esthetic realities of the dance to verbal formulas. Our ordinary methods of analysis are of very little use in dealing with this art, which is primarily a discipline of movement. . . . We are exceedingly ill equipped for the study of things in flux - even for considering motion itself as such." "The Spirit of the Classical Dance," Theatre Arts Monthly, IX (March, 1925), 176-7.

Anna Kisselgoff provides an especially candid admission of the difficulty verbalizing about dance: "Personally, this writer has never felt a dancer exert such compelling power over a viewer. If it is easier to describe the audience reaction than the actual dimension of Miss Alonso's performance, this is because the essence of that performance had some kind of ineffable magnetism. . . . It was a performance that defies analysis, and that's why it was so great." "Dance: Alicia Alonso In 'Spartacus' Excerpt," New York Times, July 23, 1979. Return to text

(7) "All dance exists in the moment. As with other art forms which exist in time, dance appears and then is gone." Joanne Friesen, "Perceiving Dance," Journal of Aesthetic Education, IX (October, 1975), 106. Return to text

(8) "Intelligence and Sensibility in the Dance," p. 210. Return to text

(9) Ibid., p. 213. Return to text

(10) "The State of Sylphs in Academe: Dance Scholarship in America," in Growth of Dance in America, p. 222. (Hereinafter referred to as "State of Sylphs.") Return to text

(11) "Waiting for the Past to Begin," p. 228. Other writers have similarly noted this puritanical disdain of dance. Ellen W. Jacobs, in explaining the recent surge in interest in dance, says that in the last decade, ". . . America finally began to loosen her chastity belt. . . . America was shedding the skins of her puritanical past, a past that had religiously taught its children to divide themselves into three parts: mind, body, and spirit. . . . A concern with and display of the body had traditionally met with severe criticism or, at best, with nervous snickers." "Why Everybody Suddenly Loves Dance," in Growth of Dance in America, p. 267. See also, Lippincott, "A Dancer's Note to Aestheticians," 100-1. Return to text

(12) "Philosophers and the Dance," Ballet Review, VI, No. 2 (1977), 74.

John Martin, long-time dance critic for the New York Times, charges that philosophers have "deliberately snubbed" dance, but he himself speaks of the enterprise of philosophy in petty, disparaging terms; e.g., "There is no intention here of expounding an aesthetic philosophy, and the right is reserved to repudiate any or all of the grandiose definitions [of art] about to be given the day after tomorrow." The Modern Dance (New York: Dance Horizons, Inc., 1933), pp. 34-5. Return to text

(13) See Cohen, "State of Sylphs," p. 224; Cohen, "Review: Dance Index," 555; Lippincott, "A Dancer's Note to Aestheticians," 101. Return to text

(14) Siegel, "Waiting for the Past to Begin," p. 231. Return to text

(15) See, e.g., Cohen, "State of Sylphs," p. 225. Return to text

(16) Ibid., pp. 223, 226. Return to text

(17) Joseph Margolis has said, for example, "It is, I think, . . . a professional cliché (and a true one) that, until relatively recent years (with important exceptions), treatises in aesthetics 'rounded out' philosophical systems, and professional discussions were led by people not especially well-informed about the arts. Also, it is nothing more than honest reporting to say that professional philosophy has, in the past, been rather suspicious of the credentials of specialists in aesthetics." Philosophy Looks at the Arts

(New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1962), p. 6

John Fisher said recently, "A couple of generations ago work in aesthetics in America was being done by professionals, but hardly professional aestheticians, for there was no profession. The pioneers were men like Dewey, Prall, Boas, Pepper, Munro. They were lucid, but the subject itself was unclear." "Editorial," JAAC, XXXVII (Fall, 1978), 1. Return to text

(18) "No one has ever tried to portray the intrinsic beauty of a dance step, its innate quality, its esthetic reason for being. This beauty is referred to the smile of the dancer, to the picturesque quality of his costumes, to the general atmosphere surrounding him, to the synchronizing of his bodily rhythm with the beat of the music or again to the emotional appeal of the dramatic libretto of the ballet: but never is it shown to lie in the contours of the movement itself, in the constructive values of an attitude or in the thrilling dynamics of a leap in the air." Levinson, "The Spirit of the Classic Dance," 166-67. See also, Lippincott's brief survey of more theoretically-inclined dance critics, "A Dancer's Note to Aestheticians," 97. Return to text

(19) According to Margolis, "Possibly the single most important factor was the founding of the American Society for Aesthetics and the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism (1942). What the Journal and the Society made possible was a sense of a repertory of fairly precisely formulated questions of an analytic sort and a sense of a continuing responsible exchange on those questions." Philosophy Looks at the Arts, p. 6. Return to text

(20) Monroe C. Beardsley is the foremost proponent of the view that aesthetics is ". . . the philosophy of criticism, or metacriticism." Aesthetics: Problems in the Philosophy of Criticism (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1958), p. 4. (Hereinafter referred to as "Aesthetics.") ". . . neither aesthetics nor criticism can be carried on independently of the other . . . We can't do aesthetics until we have some critical statements to work on." Ibid. Return to text

(21) Stephen Coburn Pepper, "The Aesthetic Work of Art," in Art and Philosophy, ed. By W. E. Kennick (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1964), p. 122). Return to text

(22) Deborah Jowitt, "A Private View of Criticism," in Growth of Dance in America, p. 207.

Previously, dance criticism was written, if at all, by music critics. See, e.g., Martin, The Modern Dance, pp. 1-2. Return to text

(23) "Aesthetics, possibly more than any other branch of philosophy . . . , gathers its contributions from a great many amateurs of philosophy. And this is worth our notice, because it suggests how quite spontaneous these philosophical questions are . . . but there are obvious dangers in these amateur contributions . . . . Philosophers are performing a service, then, seeking to sort out, in accord with the prevailing professional standards, the answers to essentially philosophical questions posed by art itself." Margolis, Philosophy Looks at the Arts, pp. 8-9. Return to text

(24) See, e.g., Levin, "Philosophers and the Dance," 76-7. Return to text

(25) "Essay Review: Phenomenology and the Dance," Journal of Aesthetic Education, II, 125 (October 1968). Return to text

(26) Lippincott, "A Dancer's Note to Aestheticians," 104. Return to text

(27) "Of Beauty and the Dance: towards an Aesthetics of Ballet," in Three Essays in Dance Aesthetics (New York: Dance Perspectives 55, 1973), p. 16. Return to text

(28) Ibid., p. 19. Return to text

(29) Ibid., p. 22. Return to text

Return to the beginning of the dissertation

Comments and questions are welcome: jvancamp@csulb.edu

Last updated: August 3, 1997

PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS OF DANCE CRITICISM

CHAPTER II

THE DEFINITION OF "DANCE"

by Julie Charlotte Van Camp

Copyright Julie Charlotte Van Camp 1981

All Rights Reserved

NOTE: This dissertation may be downloaded, saved, printed, and reproduced for personal, educational, and scholarly uses, but only if this complete permissions notice and the full copyright notice are included with any such uses. This dissertation may not be sold or otherwise used for commercial purposes. For commercial use, please contact the author.

The page numbers from the original dissertation are included in the text here as follows: /p. x.

Endnotes from the original dissertation are included in the text here as follows: (x)

Definitions of "dance" are of philosophical interest for several reasons, even though definitions are notoriously elusive and may be of limited value ultimately in understanding the phenomenon of dance and in resolving other philosophical issues.

First, a preliminary examination of extensional definitions of examples of dance and a review of the complex characteristics of dance is useful in developing accurate and adequate explanations of the artform as it is practiced, appreciated, and evaluated. At least some of the misunderstandings of dance seem to have resulted from unwarranted assumptions about characteristics of the artform. For example, human movement is almost certainly a necessary condition of dance and its most distinctive characteristic. However, movement is by no means sufficient, and the ontological status and identity of dance performances cannot be understood solely in terms of movement. In addition, understanding the special role of the human body as an instrument of dance is necessary to account for the dance world's interest in factors not perceivable in a performance and the artform's unusual identity standards.

The numerous attempts by dance theorists to define and

describe the artform are thus important articulations of the nature of the elusive artform. Seriously inadequate definitions evidence theories likely to be inadequate with regard to other philosophical claims, such as identity and ontological status. Definitions are intimately tied to more comprehensive theories on dance, as demonstrated in an analysis by Selma Jeanne Cohen of four theorists who, "Because they have variant conceptions of the nature of dance and of its function in society, . . . propose diverse means for achieving their ends." (1) Cohen also makes the important observation that "variety of conclusions is a healthy sign," (2) and that "final validity" is not a major concern at this time in the history of the artform. (3)

A second reason for examination of the definition of "dance" is that it promises to contribute some understanding to the definition of "art" itself. Defining any artform is difficult. Dance is no exception, with its multitude of genres, the diverse components in any dance performance, and puzzling borderline phenomena. Still, definition of an individual artform is a more manageable and possibly more fruitful approach to understanding art than the more commonly attempted definition of "work of art." Further, a definition of "work of art" as a conjunction of the definitions of individual artforms, as has been proposed by Monroe Beardsley, (4) for example, should include definitions of such artforms as dance and opera, along with music, painting, and literature.

A third reason for defining "dance" is that it lays

important groundwork for specifying what critics are, or should be, evaluating. Definition of an artform is not necessarily the same thing as specifying the aesthetic object, understood in the sense of the proper object of criticism. (5) However, identifying the proper object of criticism involves distinguishing those things which are critically relevant from those which are not. Understanding the phenomenon of dance from a descriptive perspective should assist in those normative inquiries, especially for an artform about which so little is understood. For example, whether music is a necessary condition of "dance" is of interest in determining whether auditory images should be included in the proper object of criticism.

A fourth reason why definitions of dance are of philosophical interest is that in much extant writing on dance, "mere" definition is really a statement of normative critical principles, and possibly, as well, views on ontology and epistemology. Such theory-laden definitions are not unique to dance, or even art generally, but they shed important light on a young artform still grappling with the most rudimentary questions of what it is and ought to be. Writers have disagreed sharply on the definition of dance, underscoring the lively interest in the issue.

Several approaches in defining "dance" are addressed here:

A. Specifying necessary and sufficient conditions;

B. Distinguishing dance from other human phenomena; and

C. Distinguishing dance from other performing arts.

A. Necessary and sufficient conditions

Many dance critics, writers, and philosophers over the last several centuries have attempted to define "dance" using a variety of conditions and characteristics:

(1) human movement, that is

(2) formalized (e.g., by being stylized or performed in certain patterns), with

(3) such qualities as grace, elegance, and beauty,

(4) to the accompaniment of music or other rhythmic sounds,

(5) for the purpose of telling a story and/or

(6) for the purpose of communicating or expressing human emotions, themes, or ideas, and

(7) with the aid of mime, costumes, scenery, and lighting.

Most definitions begin with human movement, but differ sharply in further characterization of that movement. Historically, much writing on dance has been by persons intimately involved with the production of dance, often as choreographers. Early examples of definitions of dance are thus both descriptions of the artform at the time as well as normative statements of what dance performances ought to be.

Until the late eighteenth century, definitions of "dance" (or "ballet," in the sense of "the artform of dance") seemed to use only the first four characteristics above. Baldassarino da Belgiojoso, choreographer of Le Ballet Comique de la Reine (1581), (6) wrote that ballet is ". . . the geometrical groupings of people dancing together, accom-

panied by the varied harmony of several instruments." (7) Le Ballet Comique also had a story line, but this was apparently of peripheral concern to the sixteenth-century audience. For some time after Belgiojoso's pioneering work, ballets had at most a loose thematic link between the various dances constituting a ballet. (8) In the seventeenth century, dance consisted primarily of "Court Ballets" (Ballets de Cour):

Created to celebrate special occasions, they included verse, vocal music and danced entrees. . . The dancers were the noble guests, not professionals. The dances included the various court dances of the day. . . . (9)

"Court ballets" centered on elaborate floor patterns in elegant but simple movements, a style which arose because the amateur dancers were encumbered by the heavy clothing of the day and because the audience was seated above the dancers, on galleries surrounding the dance floor. (10)

Claude Menestrier's treatise in 1682, Des Ballets Ancient et Modernes, provides an early example of critical reasoning that currently accepted theories (in this case, regarding the ballet de cour) were inadequate. He argued that the human body itself is the only appropriate vehicle for the expression of certain inner emotions, while such props as masks and costumes are inferior substitutes. (11) In insisting upon human movement as the central expressive vehicle of dance, Menestrier anticipated the rationale of twentieth-century arguments regarding normative standards.

By the first half of the eighteenth century, court ballets were superseded by "Classic Dance" (Danse d'Ecole), using the five positions of the feet and the turn-out of the legs that are still the foundation of classical ballet. (12) Productions used professional dancers wearing less cumbersome clothing and heelless soft slippers, (13) but dance was still thought of primarily as formalized and elegant human movement. In 1712, John Weaver, an English dancer, choreographer, and teacher, wrote:

Dancing is an elegant, and regular movement, harmoniously composed of beautiful Attitudes, and contrasted graceful Posture of the Body and parts thereof. (14)

Consistent with Weaver's emphasis on dance as formalized and elegant human movement, the famous French critic and choreographer Jean-George Noverre wrote, in 1760:

Dancing, according to the accepted definition of the word, is the art of composing steps with grace, precision and facility to the time and bars given in the music, just as music itself is simply the art of combining sounds and modulations so that they afford pleasure to the ear. (15)

In the latter eighteenth century, the narrative/dramatic element assumed increasing importance. Weaver had recognized the dramatic potential of dance; he argued that this should be conveyed through the movement itself, and accordingly de-emphasized the role of costuming, (16) anticipating later reformers. But Noverre is credited with developing, in 1770, "Action Ballet" (Ballet d'Action), ballet with a ". . . plot at least as coherent as that of a play," (17) thus

furthering recognition of the dramatic potential of dance. Anatole Chujoy, in the twentieth century, said of Noverre:

Not technical mastery of steps (dancing for the sake of dancing) alone was important, but a flow of action with gestures and facial expression to fit the plot, . . . Instead of selecting music and setting steps to it, Noverre looked for a story which would offer opportunities for presenting dances, studied expressions, movements and gestures that would best illustrate the theme, and then had music especially written or adapted to fit each situation in the development of his story. (18)

Significantly, Noverre's reforms are considered by some to have altered the very definition of the artform. One contemporary critic writes of this period: "No longer was mere technical execution of steps enough justification for the title of 'ballet.'" (19)

This changing concept of dance reflected the growing importance of the dramatic component of dance, consistent with an increasing tendency in the eighteenth-century to distinguish between dancing per se and theatrical dancing, or dance as an artform. Stepháne Mallarmé, in the nineteenth century, said ballet is ". . . dancing adapted to the theatre; it is pre-eminently the theatrical form of poetry." (20) Similarly, the Encyclopedia of Denis Diderot and Jean Le Rond d'Alembert, published about 1772, defines dancing as "Ordered movements of the body, leaps and measured steps made to the accompaniment of musical instruments or the voice," (21) while ballet is defined as "action explained by a dance." (22)

In the first half of the nineteenth century, theatrical,

romantic ballet gained prominence in France and then Russia. (23) Giselle, the epitome of romantic ballet, first produced in France in 1841, incorporated the elements of formalized and beautiful human movement, music, mime, costumes, scenery, and plot. (24)

In the early twentieth century, Michel Fokine introduced plotless ballets, in which a dramatic mood was expressed without any story line. His reforms were widely accepted and his concept of ballet is regarded today as the norm: ". . . a one-act depiction of character: an atmosphere: a closed dramatic situation: a movement suite as rigid in form as a music-suite." (25) Fokine is an example of how writer-choreographers have actually altered the definition of the artform, by developing critical principles presented to the public (both in the form of choreographic examples and in writing) as statements of the way dance ought to be. His famous five principles, printed in The London Times in 1914, include:

2. The dramatic action of the ballet should be continuously developed by means of movement, rather than having sections of pantomime to relate the story alternating with dance numbers that had no dramatic or narrative significance.

3. The traditional gesture-language, or pantomime, which often was unintelligible to the audience and even sometimes to the dancers, should be abandoned; instead, in its place, the entire body of the dancer should be used to communicate ideas and feelings. (26)

In his rejection of classic mime, Fokine utilizes an appeal made frequently by dance critics in justifying a particular

critical reason: anything which detracts from (as opposed to enhancing) human movement, the central expressive vehicle of dance, detracts from the overall goodness of the work. In turn, this can be justified by a principle of unity, in that elements which detract from the human movement contribute to the disorganization of the performance. Appealing to a principle of coherence, it could be argued that anything which detracts from the human movement obscures the primary raison d'etre of dance as an artform. Fokine's principles can also be seen as a stipulation that pantomime is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition of "dance."

Despite Fokine's arguments, mime continued to play an important role for some time. In contrast with Fokine, critic Mark Perugini wrote in 1915:

The chief elements of Ballet as seen to-day are - dancing, miming, music and scenic effect. . . Each has its individual history and all have been combined in varying proportions at various periods. But it is only in the past hundred and fifty years or so that they have been harmoniously blended in the increasing richness of their development to give us this separate, protean and beautiful art - the Ballet of the Theatre. (27)

Perugini apparently believed that dance is a vehicle or method for presenting a theatrical, or dramatic, performance. In contrast, Fokine viewed dance as primarily human movement which secondarily (although still importantly) expresses a dramatic concept, though not a plot. Perugini's view was widespread in the nineteenth century, while Fokine's is predominant today. (28)

Fokine's innovation of the plotless one-act ballet did not actually eliminate plot as an accepted component, but presented an additional option. Story-ballets have continued in importance, both in the continuing interest today in nineteenth-century classics and in the occasional creation of new story-ballets. (29) Later writers assumed that plots were neither necessary nor sufficient conditions, but might sometimes enhance a production, a view still held today. Perugini wrote in 1935, for example:

A ballet is a series of solo and concerted dances with mimetic actions, accompanied by music and scenic accessories, all expressive of a poetic idea or series of ideas, or a dramatic story provided by an author, or choreographer. (30)

In the decades following, the importance of plot and mime, even in the story-ballets, has declined. In 1938, critic Arnold Haskell made no mention of mime in defining "ballet" and clearly saw plots as optional, although he still considered costuming, scenery, and music necessary to ballet:

Ballet is a form of theatrical entertainment that tells a story, develops a theme, or suggests an atmosphere through the orchestration of a group of costumed dancers trained according to strict rules and guided in tempo and spirit by the music, against a decorative background; music, movement, and decoration being a parallel in thought. (31)

Typical of contemporary definitions of dance is one by dance historian Richard Kraus:

Dance is an art performed by individuals or groups of human beings, in which the human body is the instrument and movement is the medium. The movement is stylized, and the entire dance work is characterized by form

and structure. Dance is commonly performed to musical or other rhythmic accompaniment, and has as a primary purpose the expression of inner feelings and emotions. . . . (32)

Kraus identifies several elements as necessary: (1) human movement, that is (2) formalized, (6) for the purpose of expression human emotions. Music (4) is typical, although not necessary. He does not mention (3) such qualities as grace, elegance, and beauty, (5) the purpose of telling a story, or (7) the aid of mime, costumes, scenery, and lighting. This definition is problematic, as other human phenomena also consist of the three necessary elements, and some currently avant-garde dances do not include all of them; for example, some consist of intentionally random, everyday movements, while others carefully avoid the expression of human emotions.

In summary, important historical figures have agreed that human movement is at least a necessary condition of dance, but there is disagreement about the other factors that constitute necessary or sufficient conditions, or just important characteristics. They have also differed over normative standards implicit in such definitions, and the role of definitions, whether descriptive or normative. Some writers, for example, in asserting that earlier definitions are incorrect, seem to argue that certain phenomena would not count as dance performances at all. Other proposed definitions suggest that a dance performance with certain characteristics is simply not a good performance.

Oversimplifying somewhat, views among historical dance writers on the primary characteristics of dance have shifted from (1) formalized human movement, with a very peripheral dramatic element, to (2) dramatic spectacle using mime and human movement as the vehicles for telling a story, to (3) a re-emphasis on human movement, but with an integral role for dramatic expression, whether or not a narrative is involved.

As in other artforms, avant-garde experiments in dance often seem purposely designed to play havoc with traditional definitions and concepts. (33) Regardless of the intent of the creators, these experiments present an enormous challenge to both critics and philosophers in understanding dance, although it is not necessarily the case that adequate definitions must accommodate any and all such experiments.

The one necessary condition of dance, human movement, is challenged by dances (admittedly rare) with no movement, (34) or an absolute minimum of movement highlighted by stillness. (35) These dances still have a central role for human movement, in that they use a human body capable of movement in intentional non-movement.

More common among avant-garde choreographers is that use of non-formalized movements, in the sense of both "everyday" movements and random movements. Many depart from established dance vocabularies to explore the simplest of ordinary movements, such as walking, skipping, and running. (36) Although traditional ballets sometimes incorporate a few "everyday"

movements into the formalized, ballet vocabulary, they are usually still stylized or exaggerated. (37) Avant-garde experiments use such everyday movements exclusively and without stylization. One choreographer, Anna Sokolow, says she sometimes wonders about ". . . the dividing point between movement and dance. I don't know and I don't really care." (38) Aestheticians and many dance critics, of course, do care about such things. (39) Most would hesitate to call a person walking across a room (even with a radio playing in the background and another person in the room watching) a performance of a dance, although identical movements and accompaniments might be found in a performance.

The use of random movements is another rejection of formalized dance movement. Merce Cunningham, who has collaborated extensively with avant-garde composer John Cage, uses random selection methods for the choice of steps and step-sequences in his dance performances. Even in Cunningham's works, however, the movements themselves are usually part of "formal" dance vocabularies, and at least some of his dances, although choreographed using chance, remain fixed for succeeding performances. (40) "Randomness" is used more extensively in improvisational works by experimental dance groups. (41) When the improvised movements are "everyday"movements, without the accompaniment of music, it is difficult to distinguish the performance from theater, especially mime. Randomness and everyday movements again suggest that dance is in part a function of something other than the

characteristics of the movement per se, such as the relationship between spectator and performer and the standards for appreciating and evaluating the movements. The room-walking would be art if the walker did it for the purpose of being observed, appreciated, and evaluated as a performance by the other person, and if the observer also appreciated the movement as a performance, despite the absence of a traditional theater. Standards for appreciation and evaluation as dance might involve unity, meaningfulness, and so forth, rather than non-art standards of, say, how efficiently the walker crossed the room to answer the doorbell or how carefully he walked to avoid toys on the floor.

Traditional assumptions about the role of music are also being challenged. Historically, views on the role of music have shifted from (1) the belief that music should provide only the "beat," but otherwise not "interfere" with the dancing; to (2) the nineteenth-century view that music should complement, but not overwhelm, the mood of the dance; to (3) the twentieth-century view that music and dance should be integrally related, with the dance providing a visualization and expansion of the complex relationships in the music. Avant-garde choreographers challenge all of these views.

Cunningham has experimented with dances to the accompaniment of randomly-selected music, with the intention of creating dances which may not even coincide with, let along express, anything in the music. (42) Examples of dances done in silence exist. (43) Other choreographers are experimenting

with highly unorthodox forms of musical and other accompaniment, such as typewriters, (44) whistling, (45) and electronically tape-recorded music. (46)

Avant-garde choreographers are also questioning the necessity, not only of narrative, but of any expression of emotional or dramatic content. John Cage sums up this exploration of "pure movement":

We are not, in these dances, saying anything. We are simple-minded enough to think that if we were saying something we would use words. (47)

Cage does not develop these tantalizing comments, but he seems to reject all expression of emotion, representation, and meaning because such things can be better communicated with words. Earlier in this century, a major concern of avant-garde reformers was making dance truly expressive of human emotions, in contrast with what they considered to be the emotionally vacuous classical ballet. (48) Some of today's avant-garde have swung to the other extreme, attempting to "free" movement from any dramatic or emotional content at all, (49) a trend making it difficult to distinguish such dance from athletics in terms of emotional content.

Traditional assumptions about scenery, props, and costuming are also questioned. Contemporary choreographers are incorporating into their productions film, (50) closed circuit television, (51) slide shows, (52) and videotapes. (53) Others use such unusual props as oranges which are then distributed to the audience at intermission. (54) Innovations in scenery have ranged from silhouettes behind project screens, (55) or no

scenery at all, (56) to Merce Cunningham's random selection of scenery, (57) and Alwin Nikolais' efforts to make the dancers indistinguishable from the scenery. (58) Contemporary innovations in costuming range from the frequent use of only practice clothes, to the use of designer fashions and formal dinnerwear, (59) to outright nudity. (60)

Some have also rejected traditional seating arrangements, especially the proscenium stage. Selma Jeanne Cohen summarizes several such experiments:

. . . Cunningham . . . [took] his dances into art galleries to find new ways to defocus movements in space. Others tried city squares and parks, some of them devising pieces for such specific environments that they could be done nowhere else. Twyla Tharp did Medley (1969) on a college campus, where she used a tremendous expanse of lawn. . . Rudy Perez choreographed a ballet for automobiles (with drivers) performed in a parking lot . . . James Cunningham's dancers finished a gymnasium presentation by running up to the bleachers and inviting the audience to join them in social dancing. (61)

Even when they do use a traditional stage, avant-garde choreographers are apt to reject traditional uses, emphasizing the corners of the stage, for example, instead of the center front. (62) Notably, however, these changes in physical performing space have not tampered with the traditional distinction between spectator and performer.

Some would say the various avant-garde innovations not only raise questions about traditional definitions of dance, but needlessly erode such definitions. (63) Other critics are more accommodating; Robert J. Pierce has said that

. . . the avant-gardists have not rejected the most basic elements of dance; space, time, energy, human bodies. They are taking those elements and restructuring them in ways that challenge our principles and aesthetics. (64)

It is not clear how much importance should be given to these avant-garde experiments in analyzing and defining dance. The intentional rejection of accepted standards renders almost impossible reliance on a simple listing of characteristics, whether construed as necessary, sufficient, or incidental. However, the fact that experimenters single out certain characteristics as the objects of their rejection implicitly confirms the importance of those characteristics in the artform. A choreographer defiantly designing a dance with no movement in a context centering on the expectation and evaluation of movement is making a bold statement that actually confirms the centrality of human movement in dance.

The difficulty defining dance to include both traditional views over several centuries and more recent experiments is similar to the challenge in all artforms presented by avant-garde experiments. Arthur Danto and George Dickie have developed analyses which seem determined to accommodate all such avant-garde experiments in the arts, although neither addresses dance specifically or in detail. Danto is concerned that "definition is incompatible with revolution, and it is analytical to the concept of art that the class of artworks may always be revolutionized by admission into it of objects different from all heretofore acknowledged artworks." (65) His solution for explaining why an ordinary, real

thing can sometimes be a work of art derives from recognizing that art ". . . puts reality at a distance." (66) But it is not always possible to tell simply by perceiving the thing whether it is ". . . in candidacy for an interpretation, title, and structure;" we can make this determination that "something is an artwork . . . only relative to certain art-historical presuppositions." (67)

Anita Silvers has criticized the attempts of Danto, and also Dickie, to characterize art in terms of something other than the constituents of the object in question by defining ". . . art relative to cultural, social, or historical conditions." (68) Dickie uses "agents" of the artworld to confer the status of art on objects, while Danto's test is whether the object can be subsumed under an aesthetic theory. Silvers notes that the problem with Dickie's ". . . approach is that it makes it much too easy for objects to qualify as art" (69) and ignores the fact that "the point of calling something art is to classify rather than to [merely] individuate it." (70) Further, classifying art is tied up with evaluating art:

. . . when we find ourselves wanting to classify new objects as art, we typically justify our classificatory use of "art" by arguing that, according to the newly formulated theory, the object, odd as it may be, can be shown to possess aesthetic value and therefore should be honored by being called "art." (71)

Silvers does not actually propose a definition of art in terms of criteria such as "artifactuality" or "significant form," but she re-opens the search for such conditions of

arthood, from both criteria for classification and evaluation.

Silvers' criticism of Danto similarly rejects reliance upon some external context, specifically, the application of some art theory as transforming an ordinary object into an art object. She argues that there is no way to preserve a boundary between art and non-art under this approach, because there is no explanation for why a theory should be applied to one object, but not to another perceivably indiscernible from it. (72) Silvers' alternative is to consider the art object as the physical thing plus whatever "activities" by the artist make it an artwork. These activities, she says, ". . . should be counted as elements of his artistic product." (73) She does not attempt to reconcile this with the intentional fallacy, although she admits that her view ". . . count[s] elements which are not immediately present and directly perceivable as constituents of aesthetic objects. . . ." (74) But Silvers' theory is subject to the same criticism she raises against Danto. Art objects are not distinguishable according to whether they are subsumed under an art theory, she says, because we cannot specify a concept of "art theory" that makes the desired distinction. But the notion of "artistic activities" is no more satisfactory. If the activity of putting something on display in a theater makes ordinary walking an example of the artform of dance, why does not the activity of an audience member in walking down

the aisle to show off a new gown makes that walking an example of dance?

I believe the solution is to shift the test of the borderline between art and non-art from the creator or performer to the perceiver. When I perceive an artwork, whether to appreciate it or to evaluate it, I often have no knowledge of the artist's acts of "christening" or of some theorists's subsuming of the object under a theory or of the artist's activities. I might make inferences about those things by the fact that the work has ended up in a situation in which I can raise the question of whether this is a work of art, but I cannot and need not be certain about those things. What is important in my appreciation and evaluation are the activities, theories, and criteria for evaluation I can bring to the work.

Because of established conventions in ballet performances, I do not consider the aisle-walker an object of aesthetic appreciation. But because of different conventions in some avant-garde circles, I might consider activity of people who appear to be audience members in the aisle the proper object of appreciation. The avant-garde choreographer might have planned the aisle-walker's presence and activities. But it is also not unlikely today in dance that the aisle walker was not planned by the choreographer originally, but that critics and audience took it to be part of the performance, leading the choreographer to later accept it as such and perhaps to add that performance element later. Many

things also happen on stage which are "accidents," not intended by choreographer or performer, yet which are appreciated as part of the work by critics and audiences and which might later be intentionally incorporated by the choreographer.

My view does not result in total autonomy for audiences and critics in determining what counts as art, because they do not create situations which are candidates for such appreciation. Choreographers present such candidates and theorists discuss them and bring them to the attention of perceivers. Without those contributions, perceivers would not have the raw materials for making their determinations. But it is a mistake to say that the determination of what counts as the art object is made by those persons behind the scenes, especially since we often cannot know what those persons intended.

Because of the centrality of perceivers, we can account for different definitions of dance in history. What was considered non-art in the eighteenth century might now be considered art because the conventions for appreciation and evaluation have changed. It is also clear why analysis of dance must explicitly identify the context and purpose of the analysis, whether to determine what was considered dance in previous centuries or now.

Critics and choreographers provide definitions not only to describe phenomena as it exists, but also to make normative assertions about what good dance is or what the artform should become. Philosophers discussing dance have limited

themselves largely to the former descriptive function.

Etienne Gilson seems to treat as necessary conditions human movement, with formal beauty and non-utilitarian purpose. He characterizes dance as ". . . a wholly special order of the arts whose aim is to impart a formal beauty to the human being himself: to his body, his soul, or to both taken together," (75) and as ". . . the a rt which orders the natural bodily movement by imparting to them a form which is pleasing in itself, independently of any other end." (76) Gilson characterizes 'ballet" as a distinct type of dance, using several other artforms:

A ballet is a theatrical representation in dance form: it requires a play acted by dancers and mimes. . .; further, it requires the art of painting for the decor and the costumes; at times, as in the opera-ballet, it also requires poetry and spoken or declaimed language; and, finally, music always. (77)

Gilson's understanding of "ballet" is much narrower than current usage, in his requirement of narrative, music, costumes, and scenery, but his definition implies that those things are not necessary for "dance."

Joanne Friesen also characterizes "dance" in terms of the movement itself, rather than any theatrical trappings. Instead of relying on such characteristics of the movement as "formal beauty," she says, "Dance is energy which exists in space and time." (78) This incorporates "spatial design" which, at its best, imparts ". . . unity and balance as well as vitality, clarity, and variety," (79) suggesting that "formal design" is a necessary condition for Friesen. The

temporal element encompasses ". . . the structure of movement patterns and the characteristic rhythms within the dance," (80) including the rhythms of propulsion, breath, unconscious functions, and emotions. To explain "energy," Friesen refers to a certain sort of human movement which conveys a sense of "energy." (81) She thus does not rely on any particular dramatic or expressive element, nor upon such unenlightening concepts as "formal beauty," but her use of "energy" is easily as obscure.

Virgil Aldrich's approach is both more expansive and more restrictive than those of Friesen and Gilson. When he says, "A good dance is a mobilized statue," (82) he links dance with visual, spatial arts, as well as "temporal and rhythmic elements," (83) as does Friesen. He goes farther in suggesting that, necessarily, the ". . . patterns of actions . . . expressively portrays something. . . ," (84) either a story of "almost any subject matter (theme) . . . ." (85) He adds a normative factor in urging that ". . . dance at its best . . . tends to minimize, or discard altogether, narrative content in favor of the fusion of sculptured movement and music," (86) but this leaves the expression of emotion or other non-narrative meaning as a necessary condition. His reference to "pattern" suggests the necessity of some formal design. When Aldrich says, "Dancing is usually done to music," (87) he does not indicate awareness of Friesen's much broader range of non-musical rhythms, nor does he seem to think that music is a necessary condition.

Selma Jeanne Cohen observes, "The designing of the movement of the human body is the unique property of dance as an art medium," (88) but ". . . there is no problem at all to finding forms of rhythmical bodily movement that are not dancing." (89) She thus uses the characteristic of being rhythmical as necessary, but not sufficient. She then tries to identify those properties which make certain kinds of human movement examples of the artform of dance, properties which might be shared with other artforms. "Expressiveness" only partially defines dance, (90) as she notes that this characteristic is shared with the movement of pantomime. She thus considers expressiveness to be necessary, but not sufficient. She also says that dance movement can be appreciated for its own sake, independent of any particular meaning, thus distinguishing dance from pantomime, and implicitly indicating her epistemological views. (91) As with lyric poetry, dance is ". . . both rhythmic and expressive," with ". . . an important sensuous appeal." (92) "Stylized" movement is also a characteristic of some dance, for Cohen, although it might use only "natural gesture." (93) Like Aldrich, she says, "A dance is usually performed to music," (94) but she also considers dance without music, ". . . related, however, by a common pulse, . . ." (95) using an expansive concept of rhythm more like Friesen's. For Cohen, necessary conditions include human movement, rhythm, and expressiveness, but not "formalized" movement or music.

Philosophers seem to avoid labelling characteristics as

"necessary" or sufficient," possibly because of reluctance to re-enter the well-known, inconclusive debate over whether it is possible to specify such conditions for "art" or for a particular artform. Yet several, as just noted, do treat some characteristics as necessary, including human movement (Gilson, Friesen, Aldrich, Cohen), formally-designed movement (Gilson, Friesen, Aldrich), expressiveness (Friesen, Aldrich, Cohen), and music or rhythm (Friesen, Cohen). One source of the reluctance to specify necessary and sufficient conditions in the ease with which exceptions can be found to proffered definitions.

James K. Feibleman, over thirty years ago, very explicitly sought to identify "of what it is that the art of the dance primarily consists." (96) He said "there must be an element common to all sorts of dances sufficient to enable us to recognize that they are dances." (97) He finally concluded ". . . that the dance is an art in which the human body exclusively is employed in order to actualize values beyond the human which were not hitherto actualized, or to enrich such values having but a tenuous hold on existence." (98) This proposal is, of course, fraught with difficulties. He nowhere acknowledges, let alone explains, the role of music and other factors in dance performances, diminishing the explanatory capability of his theories. His proposal also seems to apply to mime and perhaps theater.

A very recent effort has been made by Janice Rio to solve these problems endemic to searches for necessary and

sufficient conditions, borrowing from the approach of Peter Achinstein in philosophy of science on semantic and nonsemantic relevance. (99) She summarizes this concept as follows:

If a property is relevant for being an x, then given that an item possesses certain properties and lacks others in such a way that it is a candidate for being an x, the fact that the item possesses (or lacks) the property in question normally will count, at least to some extent, in favor of (or against) concluding that it is an x; and if it possesses (or lacks) sufficiently many properties of certain sorts, the fact that the item possesses (or lacks) the property in question may justifiably be held to settle whether it is an x. (100)

She proposes that "x is dancing" can be understood through a long list of semantic and descriptive features. The former are those which, alone, make someone classifiable as dancing while the later do not, but would contribute to such a finding. Although this is a decided improvement over Feibleman, it is still too easy to find counter-examples. For example, the four semantic factors ("medium of bodily movement which allows x to step from one foot to another," movement lasting "for some substantial interval," travelling "through a space," and using "rhythmical bodily movement" (101)) also characterize everything from mime to wedding marches.

Further, her response to avant-garde experiments is simply to deny that they constitute dancing, because to include them would result in ". . . an almost vacuous use of the term," (102) (dancing). But the increasing frequency of such performances makes this unacceptable. One of the examples she rejects as non-dancing is on an actual program, in

which the dancer ". . . simply walked briskly around the stage in heels and a dress." (103) There are numerous examples more bizarre than this. It is comparatively simple, as Rio has attempted, to develop a list of characteristics that account for Giselle and Rodeo. There are thus two major problems with Achinstein's analysis. First, it does not deal with the troublesome avant-garde experiments. Second, it does not distinguish dance from similar artforms. The alternative approach here is to define dance in terms of two types of factors: (a) necessary and sufficient characteristics of the performance phenomenon, and (b) standards for appreciation and evaluation used by audiences and critics in perceiving the performance.

These philosophical definitions show often disappointing distortions and inadequacies, as well as some sloppy conceptual analysis. Philosophers have been especially interested in the expressive character of dance and the primitive, non-artistic roots of the artform. While the variety of components of dance has been acknowledged, their role and necessity (e.g., the role of music) have been largely unexamined.

B. Distinguishing Dance from Other Human Phenomena

Some definitions of dance are inadequate because they fail to distinguish dance from non-dance movement. Thomas Munro's broad definition is an extreme example of this inadequacy:

Dance is an art of rhythmic bodily movement,

presenting to the observer an ordered sequence of moving visual patterns of line, solid shape, and color. The postures and gestures of which these are made suggest kinesthetic experiences of tension, relaxation, etc., and emotional moods and attitudes associated with them. They may also represent imaginary characters, actions, and stories. Dances are performed by one person or two or more in mutual coordination; some animals can be trained to do simple dances. The movements are usually synchronized with, and partly aided by, musical or other rhythmic sounds. In theatrical forms, they are often combined with appropriate effects of decor (costume, scenery, lighting, and other stage equipment). . . . (104)

Like Gilson, Munro limits "ballet" to a specific type of dance, "story-ballets:"

Ballet is a variety of dance, or of other group movements in rhythm for artistic or entertainment purposes, usually presented in a theater by dancers moving in complex coordination with the aid of music and decor. It usually involves the dramatic enactment of a story through pantomime, as well as the presentation of changing visual designs in ordered sequence. (105)

Munro's definitions are helpful in setting out a wide range of characteristics, and they include almost every conceivable example of dance. Unfortunately, they also describe many examples of human movement that most would hesitate to include in the artform of dance, such as circuses, ice shows, and gymnastics.

Human movement is clearly not a sufficient characteristic of dance, as a wide range of human phenomena involve human movement, as well as many other characteristics asso-

ciated with dance. Although not the only test of an adequate definition, an important function of definition is distinction of the movement of dance from these other types of human movement. (106)

philosopher David Best recently attempted to distinguish movement generally from dance movement. (107) Although he persuasively argues that the difference cannot be specified in terms of inner feelings, which are not perceivable to observers, he concludes, unsatisfactorily, that the difference is solely one of context. (108) That only pushes the problem back one step, as he provides not a hint of the sorts of differences between contexts that make some the context of performances and others not. Similarly, he distinguishes art from sport in terms of the differing conventions of each, (109) but he does not attempt to spell out what those differences are, or examples of what such conventions might be.

Best also reveals a too-narrow view of art, in rejecting claims that some sports are, or are like, art forms, insisting on the potential of artworks for representational content, (110) and claiming that "the arts are characteristically concerned with contemporary moral, social, political, and emotional issues." (111) If that were true, either much avant-garde experimentation must be rejected as non-art, or the terms "moral, social, political, or emotional" must be stretched beyond meaningfulness.

Best also attacks the claim "that there is rhythm in

all movement" (112) by showing how dance theorists have shifted illegitimately between various senses of "rhythm" in defending the claim. Best notes, for example, that a consequence of the claim that all movement is rhythmic is "the loss of a useful distinction" between "rhythmic movements and . . . non-rhythmic movements." (113) But he does not always play fair. To show that a definition of rhythm as "force manifest in muscle action" is inadequate, he notes, properly, that one test of a definition is whether it can be substituted for the word being defined. He then, unfairly, uses a line from a song, "I got rhythm," for his test of sameness: "I got force manifest in muscle action." (114) The test is only fairly applied, of course, to a sentence from ordinary discourse which uses the term in a straightforward sense. His discussion of rhythm includes a rare reference to dance as an artform, a quotation from Alwin Nikolais, that "Movement does not have to be rhythmic at all to be dance." (115) Unfortunately, Best himself leaves unexamined his shifting analyses between ordinary movement and the movement of the artform of dance.

He explains, convincingly, that what is "good" depends on "what category or in which context it is to be understood." (116) A "good" paperweight is evaluated by a different set of criteria than a "good"piece of sculpture. But he tells us nothing about how to determine the criteria within a particular context, or whether those criteria in aesthetic contexts are objective or inherently subjective, or how

one would set about to answer these questions. Because of the explanatory potential of contrasts between dance and similar human phenomena, these are worth exploring in some detail.

An important borderline phenomenon is "floor exercise" in women's gymnastics, which consists of human movement choreographed in advance and performed to the accompaniment of music. The movements are often both rhythmic and expressive, and they are sometimes praised for being balletic. (117) Yet most would hesitate to call floor exercise a clear-cut example of the artform of dance. Acrobatics is also considered a form of sport or athletics, yet it too consists of human movement, usually to the accompaniment of music, and sometimes with costuming and scenery.

Distinguishing the artform of dance from the athletic forms of gymnastics and acrobatics is also difficult because of the twentieth-century trend, in both classical ballet and avant-garde dance, to increasingly "athletic" and "acrobatic" movements. (118) The phenomena presented in dance performances and acrobatic exhibitions may be strikingly similar, although there has been critical disagreement over the value of this trend in dance. Arnold Haskell has struggled with how to explain the difference between such art and sport:

The difference between dancing and acrobatics lies not so much in technique as in a state of mind . . . The pure dancer performs his steps, however complex, with the conception of the dance as a whole, being guided by the music, concealing his difficulties, and making his climax an artistic one. He is depicting

a definite idea. The acrobat performs his steps in such a fashion as to underline the difficulty of the task. In this case the drama is implicit in the physical performance. He is putting a question to the audience: 'will I get through without a tumble or not?' (119)

But if the difference between dancing and acrobatics lies solely in the performer's state of mind, then some phenomenal presentations simply cannot be identified as either dance or acrobatics, unless the contents of the performer's mind can be known. It seems highly undesireable to rest such a crucial distinction solely on one factor which in practice often could not be determined. Contemporary athletes, especially those in floor exercise, might also dispute the claim that they perform without a conception of the "whole" or that they strive primarily to make their movements look as difficult as possible.

Dance theorist Lincoln Kirstein is more sanguine about the similarities between dance and acrobatics, suggesting perhaps that acrobatics are one element of dance, along with others.

By definition, the dance is acrobatic. The dancer's only tool is in his or her proper human body. This tool is a universal instrument, capable of infinite articular use. But all its uses must be watched clearly by an audience seated at some distance from their actual movement. (120)

Kirstein introduces the important convention of distance between performer and audience, although acrobats and gymnasts also have audiences. More informatively, choreogra-

pher George Balanchine suggests the primacy of technical skill and manifest danger to distinguish acrobatics from dance:

[The intention of acrobats] is to prove complete mastery of their own body; to challenge themselves and the imagination of their audience; and to perform with "ease" in the face of danger. The dancer too must show his mastery of muscular coordination. But he does not stress "ease" in relation to the encountered dance. His presentation is an aesthetic manifestation. The element of danger is, in his case, non-existent, or reduced to a minimum . . . [The dancer's movements] should never be a piece of showmanship only to prove the dancer's muscular strength and technical skill. This is the acrobat's domain. (121)

Philosopher Gilson's distinction is similar to Balanchine's especially regarding the emphasis on danger and technical skill in acrobatics:

[Acrobatics] is also an art of the body in motion which has a beauty of its own, but it is not one of the fine arts because its principal end is not to create beauty but to give proof of skill, strength, suppleness and courage pushed, if necessary, to the point of rashness. (122)

These comments suggest that, although acrobatics and dance may contain similar phenomenal presentations, they are presented in different contexts, with differences in both the mental attitude of the performer and the audience's understanding of why the movements are done. In acrobatics, movements are ends in themselves, done for their own sake. In dance, movements are means to a more complex end, such as the conveyance of emotions and dramatic import. This approach has the advantage of being objectively discernible,

in contrast with Haskell's reliance on hidden intentions of the performer, although it is still too simple, for acrobats convey such emotions as fear, pride, and cheerfulness.

Gilson claims that both dance and acrobatics have "beauty," but it is not clear whether he uses "beauty" in the same sense in both contexts, or what he means by "beauty." He says elsewhere that dance differs from sports in that ". . . their end is utility, not beauty." (123) It is not clear whether he means to ascribe beauty to acrobatics at all, what "beauty" would mean in the context of sport, nor how sports have any more "utility" than art.

In sum, dance and acrobatics cannot be distinguished in terms of the attitudes of the performers (although these may in fact differ), but can be distinguished by the performance context, including the attitude and expectations of the audience, the purposes for which performances are given, and thus, the standards by which they are evaluated. This context, at least, is not strictly or primarily the mastery of danger and technical skills, even if these are present.

Figure skating is also on the fringes of dance and sport, with human movement, music, costumes, lighting, and sometimes scenery. A typical ice show has been described as a ". . . mélange of athletics, dance, mime, music, song, circus, variety show, and sartorial spectacle, . . . [falling] somewhere between 'The Nutcracker' and the circus." (124) the movements in figure skating are evaluated according to criteria used in evaluating dance performances, such as

grace, expressiveness, and technical prowess. Figure skating uses special apparatus for the feet (figure skates) and a special surface for performing (ice), but classical ballet uses blocked pointe shoes and a special wooden floor. Differences in apparatus are hardly sufficient to account for the very different categorizations of these phenomena as "art" and "sport."

Thomas Munro's approach is not to draw fine lines, but to stretch the meaning of "ballet" and "dance" to encompass these diverse activities:

. . . recently, the term "ballet" has been extended to organized group movements with artistic purpose, executed by ice skaters, roller skaters, swimmers on the surface, or swimmers under water in glass tanks. The movements of these last seem to approximate flying. The mass evolutions of aviators also resemble ballets in certain respects, and can be performed as a spectacle. Rhythmic movements of abstract forms, as in the film, have been called "dances." Thus the basic ideas of dance as an art of rhythmic movement, and of ballet as an art of group rhythmic movement, can be extended far beyond their narrow, traditional meanings. (125)

The problem with this broadened usage is loss of important distinctions between art and sport which, although difficult to articulate, exist in actual practice.

Critic Clive Barnes differentiates ice-dancing from theatrical dancing in terms of the greater excitement and continuity of the latter:

Why is it that dancers on ice can never quite offer the same excitement that dancers can on land? I think it is simply the lack of friction, which makes it both too easy and too

monotonous. Also, even with the best skaters, jumps become a break in continuity of a movement. . . One advantage they do have over their stage brethren, however. They move backward as easily as forward, and with the same kinetic and dynamic pressure. (126)

This distinction identifies alleged advantages of the respective genres, but not differences which account for one being a central example of an artform and the other being at best a borderline artform.

This same deficiency characterizes Janice Rio's attempt to distinguish ice skating from dance in terms of the necessity of gliding steps in the former and steps in the latter. (127) There are problems, first, with her concept of "steps," as "running, hopping, leaping, turning, etc.," as it seems obvious that at least those four things can all be done by ice skaters. But more important, it is most unconvincing to tie the crucial difference between art and non-art to different variations on human movement wearing different types of special footwear.

Another remark by Barnes is more telling: ". . . ice-dancers do not emote; they only smile." (128) Thirty years earlier, dance critic Edwin Denby made a similar point:

Even if it isn't ballet, there is nothing wrong with a salon style if it has objective dramatic interest . . . But Miss [Sonja] Henie does not seem to be showing a dance, she seems to be exhibiting her proficiency and her own cute person. Her amazingly powerful personality rivets one's attention firmly on her personal attractions. I looked at them attentively for four numbers. Very nice, but no drama. (129)

The expression of complex emotion and drama, central in tra-

ditional attempts to define the artform of dance, is thus used by Denby to differentiate dance from sport.

Another distinction is suggested by Barnes' comment that ". . . an ice show should not be taken too seriously. It is meant for fun and glamour. . . ." (130) Barnes hints at standards for appreciation: viewing skating as an art is misguided; as a society we agree to categorize skating mainly as sport and entertainment, and to evaluate it in those terms.

Joanne Friesen uses a similar approach, the absence in sport of a "symbolic illusion" transcending the physical components of a performance:

. . . for the percipient the dancer with one's human body must become the dance, the art object for aesthetic consideration, symbolically. Perhaps this is one distinct way of explaining the difference between dance and performance sports such as gymnastics, diving, and ice skating. In these sports, the motions of the human body are attended to, and perhaps even aesthetically perceived; however, the performer is not asked to transcend . . . the actual material reality of the body in order to become the source of symbolic illusion. (131)

It is not clear what a "symbolic illusion" is, but she might mean the expression of emotion or drama, not literally present in the movement.

Similar problems arise concerning the circus, described as "theater" by at least one drama critic, (132) and by another as an "artform," at least in Russia:

Tightrope walkers here do not just walk - they dance along the wire in the classical ballet movements that they have been made to learn at the Moscow circus school. Acrobats do not simply twist and tumble in the

air and toss each other around - they do all this with a dancer's effortless grace. Clowns do not just kick each other in the pants - they do satire and sleight of hand. (133)

Live animals are sometimes used in ballet productions although, admittedly, on rare occasions, and then only to help set a scene. (134) Avant-garde dance troupes have experimented with "scaffolding, harnesses, trapezes, and tightropes to allow them to be suspended above the floor." (135) The circus, like skating and acrobatics, can be distinguished because of differing agreements for appreciation and evaluation, with emphasis in dance on the expression of drama or emotions, in addition to or in place of mere technical feats.

Foreign cultures present more problems. An American tour of the Wushu ("traditional Chinese sports") company of the People's Republic of China, was described as demonstrating

. . . that battle can be converted into the most elegant of ballets and dangerous weapons transformed into the most beautiful of instruments . . . [T]he troupe blended sport, acrobatics and dance with high dramatic suspense. . . [T]hey moved with the precision of the best-trained corps de ballet. (136)

Because of the dramatic element, Wushu appropriately might be considered art.

American popular culture includes Broadway stage shows, or "musicals," lavish productions with dancing, music, plots, acting, and elaborate costumes and scenery - the sort of spectacle for which classical ballet is noted, as in Swan

Lake and Sleeping Beauty, although some have been criticized precisely for being too elaborate and thus too much like Hollywood spectacle. (137) If the difference between spectacle in dance and spectacle in Broadway shows is the presence or absence of taste, then some ballets would not count as the artform of dance at all, rather than as poor dance. Some Broadway shows are done in excellent taste and with excellent choreography; two of the foremost contemporary choreographers of classical ballet, Jerome Robbins and George Balanchine of the New York City Ballet, have choreographed many Broadway shows, as well as Hollywood films. (138)

The presence of the spoken word in Broadway shows, in itself, does not explain the difference between Broadway musicals and ballet spectacles. The spoken word is used, not only in some avant-garde experimental works in dance, but occasionally in more traditional works. (139) Spoken dialogue is virtually unheard of in ballet, but given the central role of spoken dialogue in plays, spoken dialogue does not seem to detract from a production's status as "art."

Neither do stage shows seem to be distinguishable because of the kind of dancing present, given the incredible variety of genres now found in both dance and Broadway shows. Nor does a special emphasis on dance provide a distinguishing characteristic, with the increasing centrality of dance in contemporary Broadway musicals. Dance critic Deborah Jowitt has noted, for example, "There is a new breed of musicals on Broadway these days - musicals that are built

on a dance impetus instead of conventional plots. . . . 'A Chorus Line,' 'Grease,' 'Chicago,' 'Pippin,' 'The Wiz,' and 'Candide.'" (140) However, current convention dictates that the choreography "must not call attention to itself as Dance or the pace will stall." (141) Even in "A Chorus Line," she says, which is "all about dancing, . . . the choreography doesn't draw attention to itself as Choreography." (142) It is not clear what differentiates choreography which "calls attention to itself" from that which doesn't. Jowitt cannot mean choreography which is simply boring or bland, as that is also common in classical ballet, and would confuse descriptive distinctions with normative considerations. (143)

A close cousin of Broadway musical plays in the musical revue, with the same components as a musical play, except that it has no story-line, and possibly no dialogue. (144) Especially when verbal dialogue is lacking, musical revues present perceptual phenomena strikingly similar to many ballets, yet most would hesitate to call them an artform. (145)

Some philosophers and theorists have taken a somewhat different approach to defining and describing dance by centering their entire analysis on the similarities and differences between rudimentary human behavior and dance, which they seem to see as on a clearly-identifiable continuum.

Historian Curt Sachs notes, for example, that ". . . the dancer shares hit motor impulse and gesture with the nondancer, who far from art conveys ideas, moods, and facts to fellow men." (146) He seems to hold (although it is not

entirely clear) that art is distinguished by its lack of significant ties to life's ordinary activities. (147) This is flatly contrary, however, to the clear importance in much dance in recent centuries of expression of important ideas and themes.

R.G. Collingwood emphasizes the expressive nature of dance: "Every kind of language is . . . a specialized form of bodily gesture, and in this sense it may be said that the dance is the mother of all languages." (148) His main interest is a comprehensive theory of expression in all artforms, his defense of which depends heavily on an analysis of primitive rituals and bodily gestures. Because dance today still centrally involves the human body, his theory leads to a distorted view of dance as a sophisticated sign language, although it is simply not the case that every gesture in the artform of dance is linked with some discrete meaning. Collingwood's theory must thus either distort the art of dance as it is actually practiced or stretch the concept of "expression" to characterize virtually all human activity. Elsewhere, he says that "generating specific emotions" is a "wholly non-aesthetic" function, (149) but he never explains what sort of emotion dance does express, nor why generation of a specific emotion might not be one aspect of an aesthetic experience.

Collingwood also conjectures that primitive abstract art is a distillation of the patterns of ritual dance forms, because, he claims, "the emotional effect of the dance

depends not on any instantaneous posture but on the traced pattern." (150) This theorizing only further illustrates the Procrustean-bed results of using dance to "round-out" an aesthetic theory more concerned with other artforms. It is just not true that a single posture in dance has no emotional effect. The wealth of still photographs of dancers amply demonstrates the emotional power of a single dance pose, frozen in time, as does the important role in a dance performance of motionless poses. Collingwood also does not analyze his use of "traced patterns." Does he mean the locations on the floor traversed by the dancers, or the movement of a limb in relation to the rest of the body in performing a certain dance movement? "Traced patterns" could be either or both, but he does not analyze and distinguish these aspects of dance movement.

Havelock Ellis also ties dance to early human behaviors. "Dancing is the primitive expression alike of religion and love . . . The art of dancing is . . . intimately entwined with all human traditions of war, of labour, of pleasure, of education. . ." (151) Ellis surveys in detail primitive religion and rituals of love. He claims ". . . the transition is gradual" from dancing in those contexts ". . . to dancing as an art, a profession, an amusement . . . ," (152) but he offers as proof only historical descriptions from world cultures without ever describing, characterizing, or defining the artform of dance as distinct from dance in religion and rituals.

Louis W. Flaccus, writing a few years after Ellis, also discusses dance in relation to its historical roots in non-art context, but with more specificity on its character as dance. He proposes first a methodology for this analysis:

(1) to attempt to mark the aesthetic meaning of the dance . . . ; (2) to characterize the different types of the dance; (3) to break up the total effect of the dance into its component elements . . . ; (4) to recapture and restate in intellectual terms the life and spirit of a dance, and the idea - symbolized or otherwise - of which it is the living expression. (153)

He then identifies four "aesthetic elements of the dance . . . : rhythm, pose, gesture, costume and setting." (154) These elements are treated as distillations of what remains in dance as art when shorne of religious and other symbolic functions in early cultures. Although a decided advance over, say, Ellis, the elements still fail at this mission. Much religious and ritualistic dance seems to include these elements, as does mime. The analysis encounters the same problems as so many others, that it does not precisely capture distinctions which are in fact made.

John Dewey also describes the roots of dance in religious ritual and natural gesture. Like many writers, Dewey suggests generally, "Dancing and pantomime, the sources of the art of the theater, flourished as part of religious rites and celebrations." (155) It is unclear, however, what distinguishes such movement from the artform of human movement, dance. On the one hand, he implies that art is distinguishes such movement from the artform of human movement,

dance. On the one hand, he implies that art is distinguished by the expression possible because of the formalized stylized quality of the movement:

Dance and sport are activities in which acts once performed spontaneously in separation are assembled and converted from raw, crude material into works of expressive art. Only when material is employed as media is there expression and art. (156)

Elsewhere, he suggests that natural gestures can also be expressive:

I do not think that the dancing . . . of even little children can be explained wholly on the basis of unlearned and unformed responses to then existing objective occasions. Clearly there must be something in the present to evoke happiness. But the act is expressive only as there is in it a unison of something stored from past experience, something therefore generalized, with present conditions. (157)

Dewey nowhere focuses exclusively on dance as an artform, and these isolated comments do not suggest any systematic thinking about the nature of the artform.

Susanne Langer developed this approach much more comprehensively. Like Dewey, she goes back to primitive ritual, and clearly thinks expression was present in such pre-art activities:

Ritual has always been a natural and fertile source of art. Its first artistic product is the dance. Ecstatic people probably pranced before they danced; but the intuitive perception of expressive form, in that prancing, invited composition, the making of dance. (158)

These rituals became an artform when they became activities performed for others instead of rituals in which all participated, (159) a recent development. (160)

She emphasizes that dance is much more than the mere "materials" of dance, such as human bodies and music: "a dance is an apparition of active powers, a dynamic image," (161) which is created "for our enjoyment." (162) Most important, "A dance, like any other work of art, is a perceptible form that expresses the nature of human feeling." (163) Dance is motion transformed into "expression, gesture." (164) What is confusing in Langer's lengthy analysis, however, is how this expression occurs, and why dance as an artform is any more expressive than natural gesture. For Langer, expressing an

. . . inward or "subjective" process . . . means to make an outward image of this inward process, for oneself and others to see; that is, to give the subjective events an objective symbol. Every work of art is such an image, whether it be a dance, a statue, a picture, a piece of music, or a work of art. (165)

Without rehearsing well-known problems with Langer's concept of "symbol," (166) her discussions of dance in particular never explain how dance movement is symbolic. (167) Is each inner feeling correlated with a distinct bodily gesture, a sort of sign language? Are gestures derived from or inspired by inner feelings, but without being strictly correlated with them? Her meaning is further clouded by her comment that pantomime ". . . is dance material, something that may become a balletic element, but the dance itself is something else." (168) Obviously, her concept of dance does not account for dances which do not express "human emotion," unless that concept is stretched beyond meaningfulness.

Langer has similarly unorthodox views on other aspects of dance. She rejects the ". . . view of dance as a gestural rendering of musical forms. . . , " (169) and emphasizes, "Neither musical rhythm nor physical movement is enough to engender a dance." (170) She adds, however, that they have an "obvious" relationship; "Whether a dance is accompanied by music or not, it always moves in musical time; the recognition of this natural relation between the two arts underlies their universal affinity." (171) But she does not explain why musical time plays an essential role in dance, nor why it is essential to the expression of inner feelings.

In sharp contrast with Aldrich, Langer rejects attempts to understand dance in terms of the visual arts, as ". . . one of the plastic arts, a spectacle of shifting pictures, or animated design, or even statues in motion." (172) She has a confusing view of the difference between drama and dance, saying that, although dance ". . . probably preceded drama. . . , and though it uses dramatic plots after its own fashion, it does not give rise to drama - not even to true pantomime. Any dramatic action tends to suspend the balletic illusion." (173) It is unclear how the portrayal of emotion by actors in dramatic presentations differs from the expression of emotion by dancers in dance performances.

Rudolf Arnheim has made a few observations on the meaning of dance movements which contrast with Langer's:

. . . all motor acts are expressive, even though in different degrees, and . . . they all carry the experience of corresponding

higher mental processes, if ever so faintly . . . the dance, for instance, does not have to endow movements with a symbolic meaning for artistic purposes, but uses, in an artistically organized way, the unity of psychical and physical reaction that is characteristic for human functioning in general. (174)

He thus holds that all movement is expressive, and that "artistic" movement is distinguished from "natural" movement by being "artistically organized." It is not clear what it means for movement to be "artistically organized," nor whether it is possible for movement to be "non-artistically organized" or "artistically disorganized." Nor is it clear what it is that all movements are expressing or what characteristics of the movement make it symbolic, but he notes that more psychological studies are needed of "perceptual patterns with regard to the expression they convey." (175) He applauds one study which attempted to correlate the expression of "sadness," "strength," and "night" with dance movements characterized in terms of "speed," "range," "shape," "tension," "direction," and "center." (176)

Arnheim also mentions the "stylized," "formal" nature of movement in dance, urging that it should not be allowed to overshadow dance's "half artifact, half nature" character, shared with such hybrid artforms as theater, photography, motion pictures, and landscape design. (177) Although this remark was not presented as a comprehensive definition of dance, it clearly includes a normative principle of what dance movement should be, which is justified by analyzing what dance "really" is.

One obvious conclusion from this survey is that merely listing components is inadequate for distinguishing the artform of dance from similar movement phenomena. A more promising approach is identifying the relative importance of these components in the appreciation and evaluation of different phenomena. A continuum can be constructed according to the relative importance of more intellectual and mental components, such as (5) telling a story and (6) expressing human emotions, themes, or ideas, as opposed to more sensual and physical elements, such as (7) costumes, scenery, and lighting, and perhaps (3) grace, elegance, and beauty. Friesen implicitly uses a continuum of seriousness, placing at one extreme "Popular art . . . which is consumer, appreciated, and enjoyed, but is not studied." (178) At the other extreme is modern dance, ". . . probably the most serious of the artforms in dance . . . focus[ing] not on how to perform given movements, but on the ways in which movement can happen in space, time, and energy." (179) In between these extremes she places "ethnic" dance, in which ". . . the viewer is asked to include in his perception an awareness of the culture of the particular group," (180) and ballet, which combines "virtuosity" and "skillful movement" with ". . . aesthetic experiences which transcend the physicality of the performers." (181)

The more comprehensively a movement phenomenon addresses the complexity and universality of the human condition, both mental and physical, the more nearly is it an artform. The

artform of dance is distinguished from other movements by, among other things, its complex intellectual, non-sensual dimension. Although some phenomena, both art and non-art are quite close on such a continuum, a sharper distinction prevails in the practices for presentation, appreciation, and evaluation of the movement. For example, the experiences of ballet presenters and audiences are shaped by the intent to explore the non-physical dimensions of the movement presentations, while the experiences of circus-goers are not. This distinction thus depends on contemporary assumptions about the role of art generally as a cultural phenomenon, exploring the complexity of the human condition in non-verbal ways.

C. Distinguishing Dance from Other Performing Arts

The previous discussion contrasted the artform of movement with non-art movement, a distinction resting on more fundamental differences between art and non-art generally. Dance can also be analyzed by distinguishing it from other performing artforms, including opera, theater, and mime.

Theodore Meyer Greene used this methodology for analyzing dance by contrasting its elements ("the human body in motion and at rest," "human emotion and conation," usually "music" (182)) with similar artforms, especially pantomime, public speech, and acting. Mime is distinguishable because of its primary emphasis on imitation, (183) although other writers have stressed the importance of imitation in dance as well. (184) Public speech and acting are distinguishable

because of their use of "the medium of the spoken word," (185) the fact that, in both, ". . . bodily movement is not as basic to it as it is to the dance," (186) although it is still important, and the absence of the accompaniment of music. (187)

A major weakness in Greene's careful detailing of dance is the tendency to fall back on an unsatisfactory and unexplained difference between "artistic" and "non-artistic" activities, as when he says, without elucidation, that the "raw material" of "bodily motion and rest" of dance ". . . is non-artistically exploited in such activities as calisthenics, eurythemics, gymnastics, acrobatics, etc." (188) Another major flaw in Greene's analysis is his lack of understanding of the important role in the twentieth-century of choreographers. He says that ". . . the choreographer can, after all, do little more than provide the mise en scene" (189) and occupies a much less significant place than composers, a view that is more typical of the nineteenth century in its emphasis on interpretations by performers over the design of works by choreographers. This distortion helps account for his difficulties distinguishing dance from non-artistic movement. The formal design of the choreographer using certain movement vocabularies is an important element of artistic movement.

Barbara Mettler's discussion of dance in terms of its relationship to other phenomena, both artistic and non-artistic, has similar problems. She says, for example, that "the experience of body movement raised to the aesthetic level

becomes the art of dance," (190) but never explains what makes a level "aesthetic" or "nonaesthetic." Indeed, most of her writing showing that "Dance is the integrating factor among all the arts" (191) is devoted to showing how each person's consciousness of space is related to his or her own bodily movements, which of course need not have anything to do with art.

John Hospers suggests that the arts be differentiated by the primary medium in which each is created: sound, two- or three-dimensional visual presentations, human movement, and so forth. (192) This is considerably more difficult for complex arts involving several media, such as opera and ballet. Hospers suggests that

. . . opera includes music, words and visual designs, although the music is predominant. Stage plays combine the art of literature with stagecraft and visual design. In the dance, visual patterns normally take precedence, while the music is an accompaniment. In motion pictures, all the elements are present. (193)

However, dance often includes an extremely important role for music, especially works by such contemporary choreographers as Balanchine. Dance can also include visual design, stagecraft, and literature, in the sense of scenario and plots, and several ballets use famous works of literature, including Romeo and Juliet, The Taming of the Shrew, and Hamlet. At least some dance performances present "all element," as in motion pictures.

Opera is even more complex than dance, at least in terms of the number and diversity of its component parts or

artistic materials. It is tempting to assume that opera is the artform that uses singing, while dance uses human movement, but this is too simple. Some dances, both traditional and avant-garde, include singing, and dance plays an important role in many operas. (194) Both opera and ballet typically include integral roles for music accompaniment, dramatic expression, plot, costumes, and scenery.

Traditionally, at least three elements were considered essential to opera: music, primarily singing; plot; and dance. Choreographer Antony Tudor has written of the importance of dance in many operas:

In the earliest operas, song and dance complemented each other; prior to the innovations credited to Gluck, many such musical spectacles consisted more of ballet than of song . . . in Gluck's operas, the earliest to be found in today's standard repertory, ballet is integrated in such a way that at certain points it is the action. The best examples of this is the Hades Scene in Ordeo; in many productions of the chorus is banished into near invisibility, or even (as in the recent Metropolitan production) completely in the wings, leaving the stage open for the conflict between the Singing Orpheus and the corps de ballet monsters. (195)

He explains that, in France,

. . . dance has kept a foremost role in opera. The role of the ballet there was formalized into an obligatory performance during the second act, in which the action of the opera was entirely suspended for as much as half an hour while dancers took over the stage. (196)

Dance continues to play an important role in many operas today. (197) Some phenomena assumed to be dance performances include an important role for singing. (198) Other works, such as Peter and the Wolf, defy categorization as either dance

or opera. (199)

Ballets-with-singing and operas-with-dance underscore the inadequacy of distinguishing the artforms by simply listing components, or by labelling one as "most important" or "predominant," because of the many things that could mean. If the "most important" aspects are simply those that use more time, then an opera might be "less" of an opera if it had a relatively smaller proportion of time devoted to singing. The "most important" aspect is not simply the central vehicle for conveying the dramatic import of a production either, as the dances can be essential vehicles for conveying the dramatic or other import of the production, not just divertissements inserted to fill up time or vary the pace.

Dance critic George Borodin distinguishes opera and ballet in terms of the conventions for evaluation. Both provide visual images; both use acting and/or mime; both have a similar relationship to music, in that ". . . both seek to elaborate and illustrate purely musical conceptions by other means." (200) But the standards for evaluating those elements differ in opera and ballet. Opera audiences are not as concerned with stilted acting and miming as with singing ability, but dance audiences consider acting ability absolutely essential for a first-rank dancer. (201) Borodin also mentions the idea (although he does not develop it) that "Every art has its conventions which have to be accepted." (202) This suggests that dance can be distinguished from opera in

terms of conventions for understanding and evaluating the phenomenal presentations, a more promising approach than simply characterizing the phenomenal presentations per se.

The theater presents similar problems. Almost all dance performances have a strong dramatic element, (203) in the sense of the expression of human emotions and sometimes also of narrative expressed through dancing and mime. Skill in (non-verbal) acting, as well as mime, has long been considered essential for a first-rate dancer. (204) Actors in the theater use human movement, and, in some productions, movement is almost as important as the spoken dialogue. (205) Avant-garde productions blur the distinctions between theater and dance still more. In many dance productions the spoken word has been used. (206) some dances have no musical accompaniment. (207) Others have a minimum of movement and a very strong dramatic or expressive element. (208) Some performances are so borderline that critics and creators call them "dance-dramas" (209) or "music-dance-theater events," (210) although dance critics still seem to treat them as dance performances with unusual characteristics. The difference between dance-with-elements-of-theater and theater-with-elements-of-dance is by no means clear.

These problems can also be addressed in terms of practices for understanding and evaluation. Dance audiences subscribe to the belief that the rhythm of the movement is central in perceiving and evaluating dance; rhythm in the physical movements of actors, though present, is of

secondary importance to theater audiences. A dancer might speak in some productions, but skill at speech is of minor importance in evaluating his ability as a performer, while non-verbal acting skill is extremely important. Music may be present in a play, to set a mood, but not in a major role to convey the dramatic import of the play; its inadequacy in a theater production is thus less devastating in critical evaluation of the production than it would be in dance.

Most problematic of the performing arts are mime performances. Different kinds of phenomena, all centrally involving human movement, are considered "mime":

(1) Classic mime consists of an artificial "language" of gestures and movement, analogous to the sign language of the deaf. (211) A few gestures from this language which dates back to Imperial Russia, are still used occasionally in such nineteenth-century classics as Giselle and Swan Lake. (212) Until this century, it was assumed that classic mime was indispensable in a dance performance, and much greater reliance was placed on it for conveying the dramatic import of a ballet. (213) As no non-dance theater performances exclusively or even primarily use this sort of mime, it is best viewed, not as a separate performing artform, but as a set of traditions which still play a minor role in some dance productions.

(2) Contemporary theater mime performances use human movement in more naturalistic, less artificial ways. In reviewing the famous French mime Marcel Marceau, Clive

Barnes wrote:

The art of mime is the art of dramatic expression freed from both the beautiful tyranny of words and the gorgeous suggestiveness of music. It lacks the specifics and the sustained argument of the theater, and it lacks the musical architecture of dance. What it has is the silent image of nature distilled into an artform. (214)

Mime, in this broader sense of "dramatic expression," is very difficult to differentiate from dance performances, as the dramatic expression of human emotion through human movement is central in both. The portrayal of characters and narrative may also be present in both. Mime of any sort renders hopelessly inadequate such definitions as James Feibleman's that dance is ". . . that art which deals with the motions of the human body." (215)

Barnes' comment indicates several inadequate ways of distinguishing dance from mime. Both share an absence of specifics and a lack of sustained argument. The cliche that "There are no mothers-in-law in ballet" summarizes the difficulty of expressing complex interrelationships in dance, but it applies equally to mime. Nor can a distinction be made that mime conveys meaning literally while dance is only symbolic, although both involve human movement invested with meaning. The mime on stage is not literally doing the things he pantomimes; conventionality and stylization are at the heart of mime, as they are in dance. The dancer of Giselle symbolizes such things as innocence and youthfulness, but the mime can also symbolize such things; neither the dancer

nor the mime must be literally innocent or youthful.

The absence of music in mime is also not decisive, in part because some ballets are done in silence. If the distinction between dance and mime were solely a function of the presence or absence of music, then dance could be defined as "mime with music," and mime as "dance without music," which is clearly uncomfortable.

Barnes makes the promising suggestion that mime "lacks the musical architecture of dance," an implicit reference to the rhythmic and acrobatic qualities of dance, present even in dances without music. Mime does seem to be more closely related to theater and literature, while dance (at least contemporary dance) is more closely related to music. Both mime and dance are artforms which use the medium of human movement to abstract from and draw out the implications of literature or music, respectively. The standards for evaluation also seem to correlate with these other artforms, respectively.

Some contemporary experimental works squarely straddle the border between mime and dance, with major roles for the movement of both dance and mime, and possibly the accompaniment of music. (216) These examples raise the same problems and warrant the same treatment as dances-with-singing and operas-with-dancing.

Clearly, dance cannot be differentiated from other performing arts in terms of the presence or even the importance of human movement. Adequate distinctions must rest instead

on a more complex analysis of the precise nature of the role of human movement, including its relative importance in conveying dramatic or emotional import, and, ultimately, standards for understanding and evaluating the movement. Earlier, the human movement of dance was distinguished from the movement of athletics by the dramatic/emotional dimension of dance, but this fails to distinguish the artform of dance from the artforms of theater, mime, and opera. Definitions informative in one context may be quite useless in another, and thus it seems futile to attempt a comprehensive definition independent of some particular purpose.

Conclusion

This survey of a broad range of historical, critical, and philosophical definitions and related characterizations of dance makes clear the diversity in the artform as it is practiced, appreciated, and evaluated, and provides the groundwork as well as the constraints on issues raised in subsequent chapters. Theories regarding ontological status, identity, and proper aesthetic object must be framed to account for these actual practices.

It seems clear that the numerous attempts to define dance in terms of its components, or elements, fail ultimately by failing either (1) to encompass all and only those instances and types of phenomena which generally are called dance, or (2) to fully distinguish the movement of the artform of dance from other human phenomena, or (3) to fully distinguish the artform of dance from other artforms. Thus,

accounts of dance which accomplish all of these goals will have to be developed on additional grounds, such as the types of standards used to appreciate and evaluate dance. However, it should also be clear that definitions can be and are very useful for limited purposes in particular contexts. For example, a definition may be quite useful in explicating differences between artforms, where that is the purpose of the inquiry even though it may fail to adequately distinguish dance from other phenomena.

This survey also shows that there is an intimate link between definitions and critical standards. Fist, definitions are frequently expressions of views on critical standards; conflicting definitions reflect conflicts in critical standards. Second, and more fundamentally, definitions, to meet any test of full adequacy, must incorporate both such components as human movement and standards for evaluation (e.g., grace and harmony as opposed to efficiency at getting to work). Reputable writers of the last several centuries have had glaringly inconsistent viewpoints. Mime has been thought by some to contribute to the goodness of a performance and by others to detract from it. A dramatic, expressive element is a virtue to some, a liability to others. The same disagreements exist regarding the role of scenery, costumes, athleticism, and plots.

However, this survey also illustrates the development of considerable agreement on many issues. One fundamental principle according to which critical trends have evolved is

that dance uses, above all, human movement, and thus, that anything which lessens the potential of that movement, or is used as a crutch to develop that potential, detracts from the value of the performance. Reliance on mime, scenery, costumes, and masks to convey dramatic import has been increasingly recognized as de-valuing or underestimating the potential of dance movement itself for conveying dramatic import. Similarly, experimental works with no dramatic or expressive qualities can be seen as explorations of the value of human movement itself, experiments dependent on the existence of the contrasting traditions.

Increasingly, dance has been recognized as a separate, independent artform, with a diminishment of its parasitic role on the values and conventions of other performing arts, especially theater. Earlier critical principles which conflict with these views need not be considered false, however, but only as no longer useful in evaluating dance from this more sophisticated perspective.

Several quite different purposes have been studied here: (1) definition of dance as an evolving artform through history, including current avant-garde challenges to those definitions; (2) definition of dance to distinguish it from phenomena which share perceptual elements, but which are intuitively or in common usage non-art; and (3) definition to distinguish it from other phenomena agreed to be artforms but with perceptual similarities to dance. It is not proposed here that an adequate theory of dance must include

three distinct definitions, but rather than a fully adequate definition must survive these three different types of challenges. Numerous definitions proposed by philosophers and others have been shown to fail at least one of these tests. Further inadequacy has been shown in all contexts of a definition that consists solely of elements, whether necessary and sufficient conditions or more loosely-grouped sets of characteristics of the phenomenon of dance itself. But reliance on the intent of the creator in christening the work as dance or an art theorists in subsuming the work under an art theory have also been seen to be both unnecessary and inadequate. Instead, in all three contexts here, the more promising route has been to make the necessary distinctions in terms of elements of the perceptual phenomena, which, in turn, are appreciated and evaluated by dance artistic standards, as opposed to either utilitarian or other non-artistic standards or non-dance artistic standards. This also leaves the artistic object intact as a candidate for such appreciation without burdening the very definition of the object with tests of artistic intention which might never be known or knowable.

NOTES

(1) "Some Theories of Dance in Contemporary Society," JAAC, IV (December, 1950), 117. Cohen analyzed the theories of Rayner Heppenstall, Lincoln Kirstein, John Martin, and A.V. Coton, whose definitions of dance were in terms of, respectively, "a finished work of art," "an acquired technique," "a natural mode of activity," and a "process of artistic creation." Ibid., 112. Return to text

(2) Ibid., 118. Return to text

(3) Ibid. Return to text

(4) Monroe C. Beardsley suggests such an approach: Definitions of individual artforms are ". . . narrower questions that offer more hope - and have not been very much dealt with. We want to know (and this is the broad question) whether all aesthetic objects have common features that could be used to give a definition of 'aesthetic object.' But before we can answer this broad question, let us divide it up and ask about the species: Do all musical compositions have certain common features? All literary works? All paintings? And so on." "The Definitions of the Arts," JAAC, XX (Winter, 1961), 177. Although Beardsley's article carefully analyzes several artforms, it unfortunately does not address dance. Return to text

(5) This sense of "aesthetic object" has been prompted by Beardsley in Aesthetics: Problems in the Philosophy of Criticism (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1958). (Hereinafter referred to as "Aesthetics.") For a recent, concise discussion of his views, see George Dickie, Art and the Aesthetic: An Institutional Analysis (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1974), pp. 147ff. (Hereinafter referred to as "Art and the Aesthetics.")

Beardsley suggests: "It seems to me useful for aesthetics to have a generic term to mark out, though vaguely, the objects within its field of interest. And perhaps with proper qualifications, the term 'work of art' will do," although he prefers the term "aesthetic object." "The Definitions of the Arts," 177. Return to text

(6) This production by Baldassarino (also sometimes referred to as Baltasarini, or Balthasar de Beaujoyeulx) has been called "the most important early attempt at creating an extended choreographic spectacle." Jack Anderson, Dance (New York: Newsweek Books, 1974), p. 11. It has also been described as "The first dramatic ballet of importance from which the history of the art may be said to begin. . . ."

Arnold Haskell, Ballet (Harmondsworth, England: Penguin books, 1938), p. 17. For more detailed descriptions of the ballet, see Mark Edward Perugini, The Art of Ballet (Philadelphia: The J. B. Lippincot Company, [1915]), pp. 52; 56-60, and Selma Jeanne Cohen, ed., Dance as a Theatre Art (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1974), p. 8. (Hereinafter referred to as "Theatre Art.") Return to text

(7) Balthasar Beajoyeulx, "Ballet Comique de la Reine," Mary-Jean Cowell, trans., in Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 19. [originally published, Paris, 1582]. Return to text

(8) Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 8. Return to text

(9) Anatole Chujoy, The Dance Encyclopedia (New York: A. S. Barnes and Company, 1949), p. 55. (Hereinafter referred to as "Encyclopedia.") Return to text

(10) Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 7. Return to text

(11) Ibid., p. 38. Return to text

(12) Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 139; see also, Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 38. Return to text

(13) See, e.g., Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 230. Return to text

(14) Quoted from Weaver's Essay Towards a History of Dancing, see Lincoln Kirstein, Ballet Alphabet (New York: Kamin Publishers, 1939), pp. 14, 22. Also quoted in Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 125; Richard Kraus, History of Dance (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1966), p. 5. Return to text

(15) Jean-Georges Noverre, Letters on Dancing and Ballets, trans. By Cyril W. Beaumont (London: C. W. Beaumont, 1951), p. 3. See also, Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 125; Kirstein, Ballet Alphabet, p. 22; Kraus, History of Dance, p. 5. Return to text

(16) Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 41. Return to text

(17) Susan Lester, ed., Ballet Here and Now (London: Dennis Dobson, 1961), p. 28. Return to text

(18) Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 38. A similar characterization is made by Cyril W. Beaumont in his introduction to Noverre, Letters on Dancing and Ballet, p. xi. Return to text

(19) Lester, Ballet Here and Now, p. 28. Return to text

(20) Quoted in Arlene Croce, "Dancing: The Two Trockaderos," The New Yorker, February 14, 1974, p. 182. Return to text

(21) Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 125. See also, Kirstein, Ballet Alphabet, p. 22; Kraus, History of Dance, p. 5. Return to text

(22) Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 125. See also, Kirstein, Ballet Alphabet, p. 22; Kraus, History of Dance, p. 5. Return to text

(23) See, e.g., Cohen, Theatre Art, pp. 66-70. Return to text

(24) See, e.g., Horst Koegler, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Ballet (New York: Oxford University press, 1977), pp. 221-2. Return to text

(25) A. V. Coton, "Looking Back and Around," in Lester, Ballet Here and Now, p. 45. Return to text

(26) Quoted in Kraus, History of Dance, pp. 171-2. Return to text

(27) Perugini, Art of Ballet, p. 21. Return to text

(28) Contemporary critic Arlene Croce writes, for example, that "International trends in story ballets decree that dancing shall replace mime. . . [I]n the best examples we have of mimeless drama the dancers fill the dramatic purpose of mime." "Dancing: Royal Jitters," The New Yorker, May 27, 1974, p. 80.

Similarly, critic Anna Kisselgoff is critical of ". . . Soviet Socialist Realist ballet, which imbued movement with meaning and turned dancers into silent actors, [while] the new Chinese ballet has kept the separation between dance and mime." "The Dance Boom In China Resounds Here," New York Times, July 23, 1978. Return to text

(29) Perhaps the best-known among the contemporary choreographers of new story-ballets is the late John Cranko, choreographer for the Stuttgart Ballet. See, e.g., Anna Kisselgoff, "Stuttgart Ballet: Tetley Era Begins," New York Times, May 28, 1975. She describes Cranko as having successfully revived ". . . the full-evening, full-company, story-ballet with straightforward narrative." Return to text

(30) Quoted from Perugini's A Pageant of Dance and Ballet (1935) in Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 36; Kirstein, Ballet

Alphabet, p. 14; Kraus, History of Dance, p. 71. Perugini makes a similar characterization in Art of Ballet, p. 24. Return to text

(31) Haskell, Ballet, p. 36 (italics omitted). Return to text

(32) Kraus, History of Dance, p. 13. Return to text

(33) Critic Anna Kisselgoff says, in a review of an Experimental Dance Series, "the works on these programs would not fit the traditional definition of dance. That is the whole point, in fact of the series." "Experimental Steps at Brooklyn Academy," New York Times, February 15, 1975.

In a review of Trisha Brown, Kisselgoff notes that ". . . the new choreographers have challenged the traditional definition of the discipline in which they work. They have, in effect, stretched the definition of dance to include elements of movements that were previously not considered dance." "Wall-Dancer Adds a New Dimension," New York Times, January 8, 1976.

In a review of Merce Cunningham's Winterbranch, Kisselgoff says that it ". . . is not a ballet by conventional standards or even a dance by everyone's definition." "The Dance: Merce Cunningham's 'Winterbranch,'" New York Times, November 11, 1974. Elsewhere, Kisselgoff says that "A dance performance is what Merce Cunningham says it is." "Dance: 'Event No. 131,'" New York Times, April 29, 1975. Return to text

(34) See note 106 below. Return to text

(35) Anna Kisselgoff says of Midi Garth, e.g., that ". . . she works with a great deal of stillness." "The Dance: Midi Garth," New York Times, April 25, 1976.

Selma Jeanne Cohen notes that Yvonne Rainer made ". . . movement as minimal as possible and discovered that, after a period of sparseness, an elbow wiggle looked positively virtuosic." Theatre Art, p. 195. Return to text

(36) Examples abound of contemporary choreographers using such everyday movements. Laura Dean, described by Anna Kisselgoff as a "minimalist" in dance, uses a "vocabulary, deliberately restricted to movements such as stamping, strutting, hopping, and spinning, played seriously and cheerfully with basic repetitions and a steady pulse." "The Dance: 'Drummin,'" New York Times, April 5, 1975.

Critic Robert J. Pierce describes Dean's work as "choreography built on simple, ordinary kinds of movement unrelated to traditional dance techniques, and repetition." He describes her work Song as ". . . composed of various permutations on hopping, jumping, stamping, shuffling and especially spinning steps. . . ." "'Everyday' Movement As

Dance," New York Times, April 4, 1976.

Choreographer Paul Taylor has also made extensive use of such ". . . ordinary, everyday movements - running, walking and falling." Carol Lawson, "Paul Taylor Dance Company At the Billy Rose, Marks 20^th year," New York Times, June 11, 1976. See also, e.g., George Gelles, "Paul Taylor: Back in the Spotlight," Washington Star, April 4, 1976.

Avant-garde choreographers Yvonne Rainer, Lucinda Childs, and Judith Dunn have also experimented with such "non-dance" movements. See, e.g., Erica Abeel, "The New New Dance," in Nadel, Dance Experience, pp. 119-20; Berman, "Four Breakaway Choreographers," p. 45. Return to text

(37) E.g., Jerome Robbins, in Summer Day, which he choreographed in 1947 for American Ballet Theatre, ". . . has woven these dance comments together with seemingly natural but carefully choreographed movements, such as a walk, a yawn, a passing gesture, a glance. . . ." Selma Jeanne Cohen and A. J. Pischl, The American Ballet Theatre: 1940-1960 (New York: Dance Perspectives, Inc., 1960), p. 56. Return to text

(38) Anna Kisselgoff, "In Anna Sokolow's Dance, Her Beliefs," New York Times, December 2, 1975. Return to text

(39) Lincoln Kirstein says flatly, "All action is not dancing. . . ." Ballet Alphabet, p. 15. Return to text

(40) See Merce Cunningham, "Two Questions and Five Dances," in Cohen, Theatre Art, pp. 201-2. See also, discussions in Abeel, "New New Dance," pp. 117-8; Anderson, Dance, p. 126; Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 194. Return to text

(41) These problematic sorts of improvisation can be found, e.g., in performances of the Grand Union. Critic John Rockwell describes the group as an ". . . improvisatory dance/theater collective. . ." and discusses whether this is "art," noting that Grand Union, and several other contemporary groups, ". . . have been attempting to bring down the boundaries between art and life." Rockwell also quotes a sculptor and performer Robert Morris as saying about the group: "'Always art but close to life; as much life in the art as possible; more life than anything else around that is art.'" "Disciplined Anarchists of Dance," New York Times, April 18, 1976.

Improvisation in dance has, in fact, been around for some time. E.g., Anatole Chujoy notes that Isadora Duncan (1878-1927), one of the first of the twentieth-century "modern" dancers, ". . . avoided definitely set movements and steps and transformed the dance into seldom, if ever, repeated improvisations which were never solidified into an unchangeable formal system." Encyclopedia, pp. 161-2. Return to text

(42) See Abeel, "New New Dance," pp. 116-7; Anderson, Dance, pp. 126, 131; Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 194. Return to text

(43) See note 207 below. Return to text

(44) See Don McDonagh's review of Jessica Fogel's Untitled Work, "3 Choreographers Spanning 3 Eras Share a Program," New York Times, February 16, 1976. See also McDonagh's review of a dance concert by David Varney and Steven Witt, "Odd Dances Given by Varney and Witt," New York Times, February 2, 1976.

In fact, a typewriter was incorporated by artist Jean Cocteau into the production of Parade, choreographed by Leonide Massine for Diaghilev's Ballets Russe de Monte Carlo. Such sound effects as ". . . the wail of a ship's siren, and the droning of an aeroplane engine" were also used in the production. Leonide Massine, "The Creation of 'Parade,'" in Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 110. Return to text

(45) Part of the performance of Since You Asked, by avant-garde choreographer Senta Driver, is accompanied by music from Giselle whistled from off-stage. Anna Kisselgoff, "The Dance: Senta Driver in 2 Premieres," New York Times, February 28, 1976. Return to text

(46) The use of electronically taped music is becoming extremely common (although often criticized), even by such companies as New York City Ballet, Paul Taylor Dance Company, and the Pennsylvania Ballet. See, e.g., Don McDonagh, "City Ballet in 'Porte et Soupir;'" Anna Kisselgoff, "'Cloven Kingdom' - A Mad, Mad Whirl," New York Times, June 11, 1976. Interestingly, Clive Barnes once praised the use of electronically recorded music in Alvin Ailey's The Mooche because it added to the authenticity of the piece. "Dance: Spring Gala Day," New York Times, April 18, 1975. Return to text

(47) Quoted in Abeel, "New New Dance," p. 117. Return to text

(48) This subject is widely discussed in dance literature. See, e.g., Abeel, "New New Dance," pp. 116-7; Kraus, History, p. 222. Return to text

(49) Abeel says, e.g., that ". . . a Cunningham dance has so thoroughly shed any vestiges of emotional derivation that it comes as close to being 'abstract' as a medium whose material is the human body can come . . . The triumph of the Cunningham idiom is that it broadens and renews the vocabulary of dance by making movement unrecognizable as gesture." "New New Dance," p. 118.

Choreographer Alwin Nikolais is described as "deliberately [seeking] to wipe out vestiges of personal emotion." Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 195. Return to text

(50) See Anna Kisselgoff's review of The Possessed by the Pearl Lang Dance Company, "Dance: 'The Possessed,'" New York Times, January 16, 1976. Return to text

(51) See Deborah Jowitt's review of Marjorie Gamso's Thread, "Can You Solve This Dance?" Village Voice, February 2, 1976. Return to text

(52) Ibid. See also, Anna Kisselgoff's review of Mimi Garrard's Brazen. "Dance: A Step Beyond Mixed-Media," New York Times, February 29, 1976. Return to text

(53) Videotape has been used by Merce Cunningham in Westbeth, Mike Steel, "Dance: Merce Cunningham," Minneapolis Tribune, March 24, 1975; Don McDonagh, "Cunningham Dance Combines images," New York Times, May 30, 1975. Return to text

(54) See Anna Kisselgoff's review of Jennifer Muller's Winter Pieces. "Dance Umbrella Season Opens With Muller Work," New York Times, February 20, 1976. Return to text

(55) See Anna Kisselgoff's review of the Dance Theater of Harlem's production of Carmen and Jose. "Dance: A Spicy 'Carmen,'" New York Times, March 4, 1976. Return to text

(56) Many of George Balanchine's ballets for the New York City Ballet are done without any scenery at all, as well as with only practice clothes for costuming. Return to text

(57) Anderson, Dance, p. 131. Return to text

(58) Ibid., p. 126. Return to text

(59) The costumes for Paul Taylor's Cloven Kingdom are ". . . elegant jersey gowns by the fashion designer Scott Barrie . . . [and] white tie and tails by After Six Inc." Anna Kisselgoff, "'Cloven Kingdom' - A Mad, Mad Whirl." Return to text

(60) Even classical ballet companies are experimenting with nudity, as in the Royal Danish Ballet's production of The Triumph of Death and the Netherlands Dance Theater's production of Reflections. Clive Barnes, "Oh, Copenhagen," New York Times, March 7, 1976. Return to text

(61) Theatre Art, pp. 195-6. Return to text

(62) Merce Cunningham, e.g., has experimented considerably with the use of stage space. Anderson, Dance, p. 131. Return to text

(63) Erica Abeel, e.g., makes such an assessment. "New New Dance," p. 120. Return to text

(64) "'Everyday' Movement As Dance," New York Times, April 4, 1976. Return to text

(65) "The Transfiguration of the Commonplace," JAAC, XXXIII (Winter, 1974), 141. Return to text

(66) Ibid., 145. Return to text

(67) Ibid., 140. Return to text

(68) "The Artworld Discarded," JAAC, XXXIV (Summer, 1976), 441. Return to text

(69) Ibid., 443. Return to text

(70) Ibid. Return to text

(71) Ibid., 444. Return to text

(72) Ibid., 446. Return to text

(73) Ibid., 450. Return to text

(74) Ibid. Return to text

(75) Etienne Gilson, Forms and Substances in the Arts, trans. By Salvator Attamasio (New York: Charles Scribner's Song, 1966), p. 184). (Hereinafter referred to as "Forms and Substances.") Return to text

(76) Ibid., p. 186. Return to text

(77) Ibid., pp. 199-200. Return to text

(78) "Perceiving Dance," Journal of Aesthetic Education, IX (October, 1975), 98. Return to text

(79) Ibid. Return to text

(80) Ibid., 99. Return to text

(81) Ibid., 100. Return to text

(82) Virgil C. Aldrich, Philosophy of Art (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1963), p. 65. Return to text

(83) Ibid., p. 66. Return to text

(84) Ibid. Return to text

(85) Ibid., pp. 66-67. Return to text

(86) Ibid., p. 67. Return to text

(87) Ibid., p. 66. Return to text

(88) "A Prolegomenon to an Aesthetics of Dance," in The Dance Experience, ed. By Myron H. Nadel and Constance Nadel Miller (New York: Universe Books, 1978), p. 9. Return to text

(89) Ibid., p. 4. Return to text

(90) Ibid. Return to text

(91) Ibid., p. 5. Return to text

(92) Ibid., p. 4. Return to text

(93) Ibid., p. 7. Return to text

(94) Ibid., p. 11. Return to text

(95) Ibid., p. 12. Return to text

(96) "The Art of the Dance," JAAC, VIII (1949), 47. Return to text

(97) Ibid., 48. Return to text

(98) Ibid., 50. Return to text

(99) "The Notion of Dancing," (mimeographed article, 1980; publication forthcoming, Auslegung), p. 2. Return to text

(100) Ibid., pp. 2-3. Return to text

(101) Ibid., pp. 10-11. Return to text

(102) Ibid., p. 2. Return to text

(103) Ibid. Return to text

(104) Thomas Munro, The Arts and Their Interrelations (New York: The Liberal Arts Press, 1949), pp. 496-7. Return to text

(105) Ibid., p. 497. Return to text

(106) This assumes that human movement is a necessary characteristic of the artform of dance, although there are alleged performances in which dancers do nothing but stand motionless on stage. In order to accommodate these isolated phenomena, dance could be characterized as using a living human body capable of movement, usually to move but occasionally to affirmatively not-move in a context of movement. The presence of the body distinguishes this from literary works, which include only references to human movement.

In Duet (1957), Paul Taylor and his partner do nothing but sit on-stage, in silence, for three minutes. Deborah Jowitt, "Rebel Turned Classicist," New York Times, March 10, 1974. See also, Faubion Bowers, "Dance: A Review," in The Dance Experience: Readings in Dance Appreciation, ed. By Myron Howard Nadel and Constance Gwen Nadel (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1970), p. 113. Appropriately, Louis Horst, a critic for Dance Observer, responded with a blank review. Ibid. footnote.

Yvonne Rainer has also experimented with "non-movement." "In 'New Untitled Partially Improvised' she comes on in leotard and blackened face; stares at the audience, who naturally stare back at her. . . ; and at very wide intervals performs a cluster of rapid, fluid movement - all to a Bach toccata. Although initially irritating . . . the piece is nonetheless intriguing, for it is playing with the idea of suggesting movement without actually moving." Erica Abeel, "The New New Dance," in Nadel, Dance Experience, p. 120. Return to text

(107) Philosophy and Human Movement (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1978). Return to text

(108) Ibid., pp. 79ff. Return to text

(109) Ibid., p. 120. Return to text

(110) Ibid., pp. 115, 117. Return to text

(111) Ibid., p. 115. Return to text

(112) Ibid., p. 39. Return to text

(113) Ibid., p. 45. Return to text

(114) Ibid., p. 44. Return to text

(115) Ibid. Return to text

(116) Ibid., p. 67. Return to text

(117) See, e.g., Linda Bird Francke's description of women's gymnastics, "On the Beam," Newsweek, May 19, 1975, p. 93: "Requiring grace, poise and coordination, gymnastics is more akin to dancing than to other rougher, contact sports." Francke also quotes a gymnastic coach as saying "It's a show sport . . . you have to be a little actress." Return to text

(118) Although ballet historically was an outgrowth, in part, of roving troupes of tumblers and acrobats in the sixteenth century (see, e.g., Haskell, Ballet, p. 19), during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, any hint of athleticism was shunned as antithetical to the spirit of ballet. It was not until the twentieth century that "athleticism" became a positive attribute in ballet performances. At present, athleticism is widely accepted as a virtue, within limits, and examples abound in critical descriptions.

For example, the dancing in Jerome Robbins' classical ballet The Goldberg Variations for the New York City Ballet has been praised by Alan M. Kriegsman as ". . . invested with an athletic, crisply contemporary vigor." "Ensemble Work - With Fireworks," Washington Post, February 26, 1976.

Critic Don McDonagh refers to the "gymnastic tumbles" in the New York City Ballet's production of Variations pour une Porte et un Soupir, choreographed by George Balanchine. "City Ballet in 'Porte et Soupir,'" New York Times, June 11, 1976.

Critic Anna Kisselgoff refers to "the gymnastic choreography" of Gerald Arpino's The Relativity of Icarus, "The Dance," New York Times, October 25, 1976.

Chichicastenango, a modern troupe, has been described as "pleasantly athletic" by Don McDonagh. "Chichicastenango Gives Dances in Athletic and Eccentric Style," New York

Times, April 6, 1975.

Twentieth-century Russian ballet has also been especially noted for its emphasis on athletics, to the considerable extent of contemporary American ballet. Selma Jeanne Cohen notes, e.g., that "In the state-supported schools [in the Soviet Union] the legacy of the danse d'ecole was maintained but extended; jumps reached breathtaking heights; the body became incredibly flexible; a partner supported his ballerina with a single hand and held her high over his head. The Bolshoi did all this with athletic exuberance; the Kirov was softer but no less spectacular." Theatre Art, p. 154.

Clive Barnes has noted the considerable impact of this Russian athleticism on American ballet: "Before the Soviet invasion of some 20 years ago, in the West it would have been regarded as vulgar for a man to lift a ballerina above his head to the full extent of his arms - today it is the custom -- while one-handed lifts and spins in the air were regarded as acrobatics and not part of the dance vocabulary. The Russians changed all that, and weightlifting in a gymnasium became part of the training regime for quite a number of Western dancers who needed simply to develop more physical strength." "True Partnering - when Two Dance as One," New York Times, October 19, 1975. See also Lincoln Kirstein, Blast at Ballet: A Corrective for the American Audience (New York: Marstin Press, Inc., 1938), p. 99.

Significantly, not everyone in classical ballet, including the English, has accepted this increasing athleticism so readily. Reportedly, e.g., when American Ballet Theatre performed in London during the season of 1945-46, "London was . . . unenthusiastic about the virtuoso pas de deux and the general American approach to the classics, which the English found rather too athletic for their taste." Cohen, American Ballet Theatre, p. 51.

Avant-garde troupes have pushed even beyond "athleticism" and border more on "athletics." For example, the Pilobolus Dance Theater originally utilized primarily acrobatic and tumbling movements, then branched out into more traditional dance movements, but the group is still sometimes characterized as providing "an acrobatic tumbling feat." Dena Davida, "Pilobolus: A Re-View," Many Corners III, February, 1975. Clive Barnes notes that "They are not really trained dancers; rather, they have brought to dance a background in sports and gymnastics. This can perhaps best be seen in . . . 'Pseudopodia' [which] consists of crawling, twisting, somersaulting, cartwheeling and general progressing across the stage." "Two Young Troupes - off and Running," New York Times, March 14, 1976. See also, Peter Altman, "Dance program entertaining but lacking," Minneapolis Star, January 13, 1975; Clive Barnes, "Dance: Pilobolus Images," New York Times, March 7, 1976; Anna Kisselgoff, "Pilobolus Dancing its Way to Togetherness," New York Times, March 5, 1976; Allen Robertson, "Pilobolus Dance Theater,"

Minnesota Daily, January 17, 1975; Jack Anderson, "Pilobolus at American Dance Festival," New York Times, July 31, 1978. Performance seen by this writer, National Theater, Washington, D.C., April l11, 1977.

Another experimental modern group, the Zero Moving company, has used a giant white rubber mattress, first, deflated, as a floorcloth, and then, inflated, as a trampoline. Anna Kisselgoff, "Dance: Zero Movers," New York Times, April 20, 1975. Return to text

(119) Ballet, pp. 42-3 (italics omitted). Return to text

(120) Blast at Ballet, p. 99 (underlining added). Return to text

(121) George Balanchine, "Marginal Notes on the Dance," in The Dance Has Many Faces, ed. By Walter Sorrell (New York: Columbia University Press, 1966), pp. 96-7. Return to text

(122) Gilson, Forms and Substances, pp. 196-7. Return to text

(123) Ibid., p. 185. Return to text

(124) Lawrence Van Gelder, "The 'Ice Capades' at 35," New York Times, January 9, 1976.

More recently, skater John Curry has attempted to ". . . integrate skating and ballet into a separate artistic category . . . [which] exists between competitive figure skating and the Ziegfeld Follies-like extravaganzas of the touring ice shows." Jack Egan writes, "Curry seemed to prove that dance on ice could uphold the highest values of ballet movement while exploring a new territory that transcends the possibilities of ballet because of the freedom of movement ice offers." "John Curry-Skating on the Edge of Ballet," Washington Post, July 2, 1987. Return to text

(125) The Arts and Their Interrelations, p. 496. Return to text

(126) "'Ice Follies' Good Example of Genre," New York Times, September 27, 1974. Return to text

(127) "The Notion of Dancing," pp. 5, 7. Return to text

(128) "'Ice Follies.'" Return to text

(129) "Skating as a Form of Ballet" (January 23, 1944), in Edwin Denby, Looking at the Dance (New York: Horizon Press, 1949), p. 381. Return to text

(130) "'Ice Follies.'" Return to text

(131) "Perceiving Dance," 102. Return to text

(132) John Simon, "The Theater or The Tiger," New York Magazine, April 14, 1975, p. 72. Review of Ringling Bros. And Barnum & Bailey. Return to text

(133) Christopher Wren, "In Russia, The Circus Is an Art Form," New York Times, December 14, 1975. Return to text

(134) In American Ballet Theatre's production of Giselle, a hunting dog is brought on stage in the first act just before the royal hunting party enters. Performances seen by this writer, October 4, 1975; April 4, 1976; March 23, March 24, April 9, December 18, 1977, Kennedy Center, Washington, D.C.; January 11, 1976, Uris Theatre, New York, N.Y. A large dog is also brought on stage in ABT's production of Swan Lake. Performances seen by this writer, April 11, 1976; March 14, March 19, 1978, Kennedy Center. Return to text

(135) See Anna Kisselgoff's review of Rebound by Batya Zamir, "Dance: Above the Ground," New York Times, March 8, 1976. Choreographer Stephanie Evanitsky's Buff Her Blind - To Open the Light of the Body uses ". . . a scaffold . . . with nine elastic tightropes stretched across at three levels." Anna Kisselgoff, "Dance: Miss Evanitsky," New York Times, March 12, 1975. Choreographer Trisha Brown uses harnesses on pulleys to enable her dancers to literally walk on walls during some of her dances. Anna Kisselgoff, "Wall-Dancer Adds a New dimension," New York Times, January 8, 1976; see also, Susan K. Berman, "Four Breakaway Choreographers," Ms. Magazine III (April, 1975), p. 44. Even the traditional American Ballet Theatre once had ballerina Nora Kaye ". . . swinging head down on [a] rope ladder." Quoted from John Martin's review of The Sphinx in the New York Times on April 22, 1955. Cohen, American Ballet Theatre, p. 82. Return to text

(136) "Chinese Fireworks," Newsweek LXXXIV (July 15, 1974), p. 52. Return to text

(137) American Ballet Theatre's production of the Petipa classic Raymonda, e.g., was described by critic George Gelles as ". . . cosmetic pattern-making that was kept alive in a transformed version in the Hollywood dance extravaganzas. . . [Raymonda and the movie "The Gang's All Here"] derive a good deal of a common tradition that's concerned with eye-filling balance and order." "'Raymonda' Falls Prey

to a Few Pitfalls suffered by Most Revivals," Washington Star, April 9, 1976.

A similar criticism was made by John Martin of a production of Giselle in 1946: "'Last night at the Broadway Theatre the Ballet Theatre presented the premiere of two settings, plus two additional act-drops, and some fitly ornate and elaborate costumes that would have graced any of the better editions of Ziegfeld's "Follies" . . . '" Quoted in Cohen, American Ballet Theatre, p. 54. Return to text

(138) "His basic theatricality has made Robbins a vigorous choreographer and director on Broadway, where his successes include West Side Story, Gypsy, and Fiddler on the Roof." Anderson, Dance, p. 144.

". . . the dance sequences that Balanchine composed for such musicals as On Your Toes (with its 'Slaughter on Tenth Avenue' gangster ballet), Babes in Arms, and The Boys from Syracuse - and for such films as The Goldwyn Follies - were enormously popular." Anderson, Dance, p. 100. Return to text

(139) Fall River Legend, the story of Lizzie Borden choreographed by Agnes de Mille in 1948 for American Ballet Theatre, begins with a spoken monologue by the Speaker for the Jury. American Ballet Theatre 1976 (souvenir program). Performances seen by this writer, January 24, 28, and 30, 1976, Uris Theatre, New York, N.Y.

Martha Graham also sometimes used the spoken word throughout her dances. Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 215.

See also, note 206 below. Return to text

(140) "Dance Makes the Musicals Go 'Round," New York Times, November 23, 1975. Return to text

(141) Ibid. Return to text

(142) Ibid. Return to text

(143) John Martin, formerly dance critic of the New York Times, once coined the term "spectacular dance" to encompass both "ballet and the dance in musical comedies, revues, etc." Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 448. This, of course, does not resolve our problem either. Martin's term notes the similarities between ballet and such musical productions, without explaining why we continue to distinguish between the genres and without explaining why we hesitate to call musical shows and revues artforms. His remark is puzzling since Martin elsewhere has criticized ballets by characterizing them as "revue dancing." See his review of Ballet Theatre's Quintet, New York Times, February 2, 1940. Quoted in Cohen, American Ballet Theatre, p. 15. Return to text

(144) Theater critic Walter Kerr describes a recent production, Bubbling Brown Sugar, as part of the "strange breed" of musical revues: "Since by definition they lack narratives to push them along . . . and since they're composed of bits and pieces supplied by many hands . . . , revues need something to glue them together . . . A revue is an artfully designed collage of personality or it's nothing." "'Bubbling Brown Sugar,'" New York Times, March 7, 1976. Unfortunately, the same characterization can be made of many plotless ballets.

Another problematic case is the Radio City Music Hall precision dancers, the Rockettes, and the Music Hall Ballet. Anatole Chujoy describes them as "the only resident ballet company in U.S. (sic) which performs fifty-two weeks a year." Encyclopedia, p. 397. But although many are uncomfortable with considering the Rockettes a legitimate artform, surely it cannot be simply on the grounds that they "appeals to the masses," as this would also exclude Anna Pavlova. Return to text

(145) Some have directly addressed the question whether these phenomena should be considered artforms, but usually with unsatisfactory results. Dancer Gene Kelly said, e.g., that "We considered what we did an art form, even though it was popular." Robert Lindsey, "Astair, Kelley to Be Honored Tonight," New York Times, May 10, 1976. Clive Barnes once noted that "The difference between art dance and pop dance [in Broadway shows] . . . is vast." But his main points of differentiation are that the choreography in Broadway shows is ". . . undemanding, and not even particularly inventive . . . simple, even stereotyped." "Choreographers Cast Their Spell Over Broadway," New York Times, April 11, 1976. This again leaves us in the uncomfortable position of not being able to explain why certain ballets with "undemanding, uninventive, simple, stereotyped" choreography are still ballets, albeit poor ones. Return to text

(146) The Commonwealth of Art (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1946), p. 225. Return to text

(147) Ibid., see, e.g., p. 227. Return to text

(148) The Principles of Art (New York: Oxford University Press, 1938), pp. 243-4. Return to text

(149) Ibid., pp. 76-7. Return to text

(150) Ibid., p. 55. Return to text

(151) The Dance as Life (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1923), p. 35. Return to text

(152) Ibid., p. 48. Return to text

(153) Ibid., p. 76. Return to text

(154) Ibid., p. 86. Return to text

(155) Art as Experience (New York: Capricorn Books, 1934), p. 7. Return to text

(156) Ibid., p. 63. Return to text

(157) Ibid., p. 71. Return to text

(158) Problems of Art (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1957), p. 121. Return to text

(159) Susanne K. Langer, Feeling and Form (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1953), p. 199. Return to text

(160) Ibid., p. 207. Return to text

(161) Langer, Problems of Art, p. 5. Return to text

(162) Ibid., p. 6. Return to text

(163) Ibid., p. 7. Return to text

(164) Langer, Feeling and Form, p. 174. Return to text

(165) Langer, Problems of Art, p. 9. Return to text

(166) See, e.g., Bernhard F. Scholz, "Discourse and Intuition in Susanne Langer's Aesthetics of Literature," JAAC, XXXI (Winter, 1972), 215-26; Curtis L. Carter, "Langer and Hoffstadter on Painting and Language: A Critique," JAAC, XXXII (Spring, 1974), 331-42. Return to text

(167) She apparently thinks her discussion clarifies the meaning of "symbol." See, e.g., Langer, Problems of Art, pp. 9-10. She does admit that she has not attempted in that context to explain "the meaning of dance gesture." Ibid., p. 11. Return to text

(168) Langer, Feeling and Form, p. 173. Return to text

(169) Ibid., p. 169. Return to text

(170) Langer, Feeling and Form, p. 172. Return to text

(171) Ibid., p. 198. Return to text

(172) Ibid., p. 172. See also, p. 56. Return to text

(173) Ibid., p. 322. Return to text

(174) Toward a Psychology of Art (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1966), p. 69 (emphasis added). Return to text

(175) Ibid., p. 70. Return to text

(176) Ibid., pp. 70-1. Return to text

(177) Ibid., p. 127. Return to text

(178) "Perceiving Dance," 102. Return to text

(179) Ibid., p. 104. Return to text

(180) Ibid., 102-3. Return to text

(181) Ibid., 103. Return to text

(182) The Arts and the Art of Criticism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1947), p. 35. Return to text

(183) Ibid., p. 64. Return to text

(184) See, e.g., Selma Jeanne Cohen, "Dance as an Art of Imitation," JAAC, XII (1953), 232. Return to text

(185) Greene, The Arts and the Art of Criticism, p. 64. Return to text

(186) Ibid., p. 65. Return to text

(187) Ibid. Return to text

(188) Ibid., p. 66. Return to text

(189) Ibid., p. 200. Return to text

(190) "The Relation of Dance to the Visual Arts," JAAC, V (1946-7), 203. Return to text

(191) Ibid. Return to text

(192) See, e.g., John Hospers, "Aesthetics, Problems of," in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. by Paul Edwards (New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1967), vol. I, pp. 40, 52. Return to text

(193) Ibid., p. 40. Return to text

(194) Critic Clive Barnes considers operas which include ballet inappropriate "two-headed monster(s)." he argues, "One difficulty is the timing - dance moves so much faster than opera, so that to combine the two on the same stage is contrary to the interests of each." But while Barnes' remarks constitute arguments for a normative definition of what good opera ought to be, it is still the case that these opera-ballets do exist. The question thus remains on what grounds we distinguish operas-which-include-ballet from ballets-that-include-singing. "Operas Should Sing and Ballets Should Dance," New York Times, November 3, 1974. Return to text

(195) "Movement in Opera," in Nadel, Dance Experience, p. 180. Probably the most extreme case of emphasis on dance in this opera occurred in 1936 when George Balanchine, then choreographer of the American Ballet (predecessor of the present New York City Ballet, and, at the time, the ballet company of the Metropolitan Opera), staged Orpheus as a ballet, with the singers in the orchestra pit. It was reportedly quite unpopular with the tradition-minded opera audience. Chujoy, Encyclopedia, pp. 8-9. Return to text

(196) Tudor, "Movement," p. 180. Return to text

(197) Dance is also important in the Chinese Peking Opera, described by dance critic Jack Anderson as ". . . that uniquely Chinese mixed-media form that combines dancing, acting, singing and acrobatics in an unusually robust manner." "Chinese Troupe Dances Peking Opera Excerpts," New York Times, July 8, 1978. Return to text

(198) The ballet Le Baiser de la Fee (The Fairy's Kiss), choreographed by John Neumeier in 1972, includes the complete singing of Tchaikovsky's "Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt" (None but the Lonely Heart ) by a member of the cast on stage. The singing of the song is an integral part of the dramatic narrative, and not just a device to set a mood. Performance seen by this writer February 1, 1976, American Ballet Theatre, Uris Theatre, New York, N.Y.

New York City Ballet's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream includes two vocal soloists and a chorus of eight. Performance seen by this writer, Kennedy Center, March 12, 1977.

Senta Driver has also made extensive use of song, as well as speech in her modern dances. Anna Kisselgoff, "Dance: Senta Driver's 'On Doing,'" New York Times, July 18, 1978. Return to text

(199) Peter and the Wolf has been described by dance critic Cyril W. Beaumont in Supplement to Complete Book of Ballets (London: C. W. Beaumont, 1942), as ". . . not a ballet, but a spoken tale with music, commentary, underlined with actions or decorated with brief dances and phrases of dancing." (p. 159) Note, however, that this production was reviewed by a dance critic in a book about ballets.

Another contemporary work, Gian Carlo Menotti's The Unicorn, The Gorgon, and the Manticore, defies categorization. The one-act score, calling for ballet, chorus, and chamber orchestra, has been in the repertoire of the New York City Ballet, the Washington Ballet, the Opera society of Washington, and the Paul Hill Chorale. Paul Hume, "The 'Unigorticore' With Music and Ballet," Washington Post, July 2, 1975. Performance seen by this writer, November, 1977, Washington Ballet and Paul Hill Chorale, Kennedy Center, Washington, D.C.

Carl Orff's score for Carmina Burana, for orchestra, chorus, and soloists has been choreographed by several contemporary choreographers. The Pennsylvania Ballet, using John Butler's choreography, locates the chorus in the orchestra pit. Performance seen by this writer, Academy of Music, March 14, 1974. The Washington Ballet uses James Clouser's choreography, with the Paul Hill Chorale seated on stage across the entire width of the stage and the dancers in front of them. Performance seen by this writer, Kennedy Center, November, 1977. Return to text

(200) Invitation to Ballet (London: Werner Laurie, 1950), p. 220. Return to text

(201) Ibid., p. 221. Return to text

(202) Ibid., p. 222. Return to text

(203) See, e.g., Clive Barnes' comment that "Not all of drama is found in drama. Quite a lot can be found in dance." "Critic's Notebook: Camera, Lights, Action," New York Times, July 15, 1975.

Another of the many persons emphasizing this strong link between drama and dance is the contemporary German choreographer Kurt Jooss, who describes himself as "a playwright of movement" and has been a proponent of "Bewegunssprache, literally 'movement speech,' a theory which maintained that dance, drama and music were derived from a single root and should be taught together." Roy Koch, "'I'm a Playwright of Movement,'" New York Times, March 14, 1976. Return to text

(204) E.g., critic Arnold Haskell has said that ". . . it is wrong to consider dancing purely from the point of view of the movements of the legs. The dancer must be completely expressive from head to foot. The face is as much a part of the dancer's instrument as the feed and arms." Haskell, Ballet, p. 38. Return to text

(205) Carol Egan writes that "It is not only in Germany and Poland, however, that one finds the movement-oriented actor. Performances by the Piccolo Teatro of Milan are as perfect choreographically as they are theatrically. The actors seem literally to dance their roles. Has one ever seen Sir Laurence Olivier take a 'false step'? Every nuance of his gestures gives evidence of years of discipline and training." "Movement and the Theatre," in Nadel, Dance Experience, pp. 176-7. Return to text

(206) Eugene Loring choreographed a "balletplay" for American Ballet Theatre in 1940 called The Great American Goof with dialogue by William Saroyan. The work, which combined dance and speech, was described by critic John Martin that year as ". . . strik[ing] out boldly in the direction of a new and authoritative idiom." Cohen, American Ballet Theatre, p. 9

A work for American Ballet Theatre in 1956 called The Enchanted had major passages of spoken drama. Cohen, American Ballet Theatre, pp. 86-7.

Another ABT production, On Stage, produced in 1945, made "sparing, piquant use of speech." Cohen, American Ballet Theater, p. 47.

Contemporary experimental dance performances have also made use of the spoken word in their productions. Don McDonagh describes a production by Grand Union as "Words, movement and music whirl[ing] about as members reacted to one another in movement or verbal commentary." "Grand Union's Skits Now More Formula Than Improvisation," New York Times, April 25, 1976.

Anna Kisselgoff wrote that "Valerie Bettis' Theater

Dance Company is presenting a one-act play and some poems. . . There is . . . a considerable amount of movement by the actors that not only accompanies the text but also, fortunately, rounds out a picture the dialogue alone dies not always fill in . . . . The poems . . . were enacted rather than 'read.'" "Dance: Bettis Troupe Presents Drama." New York Times, February 16, 1975.

Don McDonagh describes the performer of Bettis' work The Desperate Heart "As a simultaneous speaker and performer of poetry. . ." "Wayne Group Dances at Jacob's Pillow," New York Times, August 14, 1975.

Poetry is also read in The Winter Calligraphy of Ustad Selim by Randolyn Zinn. Don McDonagh, "Dances are Shared by Francis Petrelle and Randolyn Zinn," New York Times, February 11, 1976. Return to text

(207) Moves, by Jerome Robbins, was created in 1959 for the Spoleto Festival in Italy and was given recently by the City Center Joffrey Ballet in New York in the spring of 1976. Clive Barnes, "Ballet: Timeless 'Moves,'" New York Times, April 2, 1976. See also, Anna Kisselgoff, "Musicless 'Moves' Danced by Joffrey," New York Times, October 16, 1975.

Carlota, choreographed by Jose Limon, is performed in silence. Clive Barnes, "Dance: 'Mexican Tribute,'" New York Times, April 6, 1975.

Session, by avant-garde choreographer Lar Lubovitch, and One Good Turn, by Sara Rudner, are also done in silence. Clive Barnes, "Dance: Lar Lubovitch," New York Times, April 25, 1976.

Early modern dance pioneer Mary Wigman also experimented for a time with dances done without music or other audio accompaniment. John Martin, Introduction to the Dance (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1939), p. 234.

Other ballets done without music include David Lichine's La Creation, and Walter Gore's Eaters of Darkness. Clive Barnes, "'Moves.'" Return to text

(208) The Stuttgart Ballet's production of The Taming of the Shrew is described by Alan M. Kriegsman as demonstrating "how far a ballet can go on the barest minimum of dance." Washington Post, June 27, 1975.

Black Ritual, choreographed by Agnes de Mille for American Ballet Theatre in 1940, was described by John Martin as having "comparatively little movement . . . [H]er moments of stillness are potentially exciting in themselves." Cohen, American Ballet Theatre, p. 13. Return to text

(209) Don McDonagh, e.g., has characterized work by Bob Bowyer as "dance dramas." "Dance by Bowyer Are Small Dramas With Core of Truth," New York Times, January 28, 1975. Return to text

(210) Clive Barnes characterized Quarry, an experimental work by Meredith Monk, as a "music-dance-theater event." Barnes notes that Monk has described her own works variously as "operas, opera-epics, theater cantatas, live movies, composite theater, non-verbal opera, visual poetry, image dance and mosaic theater." "Meredith Monk's Tapestry of Music and Dance," New York Times, March 28, 1976. Return to text

(211) E.g., ". . . the pointing of the index finger of the right-hand to the first joint of the ring finger of the left hand, where the wedding ring is usually worn, . . . indicate[s] wedding, married, husband, wife, etc." Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 352. Return to text

(212) Many contemporary productions of such classics still incorporate some simple mime gestures. Performances seen by this writer, including: Giselle, American Ballet Theatre, Ballet Nacional de Cuba, London Festival Ballet; Sleeping Beauty, American Ballet Theatre, Stuttgart Ballet, Royal Ballet; Swan Lake, American Ballet Theatre, Royal Ballet, 1975-81. Return to text

(213) Thomas Munro also seems to assume that mime is essential for conveying a narrative through human movement. See note 20 above. Return to text

(214) "Marceau's Lyric Poems of Movement," New York Times, April 6, 1975. Return to text

(215) Quoted from Aesthetics: A Study of the Fine Arts in Theory and Practice (New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1949), p. 302, in Kraus, History, p. 6. Return to text

(216) See, e.g., Clive Barnes' review of Frank Wedekind's Menagerie of the Empress Phylissa, which Barnes describes ". . . as danced and mimed, or mimed and danced, by Henryk Tomaszewski's Polish Mime Ballet Theater." "Dance: Mime of Poland," New York Times, February 24, 1976. Alan Kriegsman says of this same production that "the troupe seemed expertly schooled in mime, acting, dance and acrobatics" and notes that the production includes imaginative "decor, music and lighting," familiar elements, of course, in ballet productions. Washington Post, March 1, 1976. Return to text

Return to the beginning of the dissertation

Comments and questions are welcome: jvancamp@csulb.edu

Last updated: August 15, 1997

PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS OF DANCE CRITICISM

CHAPTER III

THE MULTIPLE MEDIA OF DANCE

by Julie Charlotte Van Camp

Copyright Julie Charlotte Van Camp 1981

All Rights Reserved

NOTE: This dissertation may be downloaded, saved, printed, and reproduced for personal, educational, and scholarly uses, but only if this complete permissions notice and the full copyright notice are included with any such uses. This dissertation may not be sold or otherwise used for commercial purposes. For commercial use, please contact the author.

The page numbers from the original dissertation are included in the text here as follows: /p. x.

Endnotes from the original dissertation are included in the text here as follows: (x)

As several media are involved in dance, analysis of only one of those media does not completely explain dance, nor do analyses of single-medium or pure artforms necessarily explain the mixed or impure artform of dance without distortion of either the theory or the artform. In this chapter, it is argued that the medium of dance is neither purely physical movement nor purely mental, but that neither is the medium of dance a "fusion," "assimilation," or "amalgamation" of physical movement, auditory images, and visual designs. Dance is more adequately explained as consisting of primary media of movement and music (or, more generally, auditory images), including rhythm), and secondary media of costumes, scenery, and lighting. Even so, dance is a distinct artform, not merely a collaboration of several pure artforms.

Problems will then be considered which arise for the critic and the philosopher of criticism from this multi-media character of dance. Evaluation of the individual media in a given performance need not necessarily be the same as if each medium were evaluated separately in the context of the artform using only that medium. Evaluation of the music at a ballet performance could be quite different,

both in reasons and final appraisal, from an evaluation of precisely the same sounds in a concert hall. The standards of "appropriateness" between the various media plays a special role in evaluation of dance, for example, and the meaning of such standards as "appropriateness" cannot be properly understood without clarification of the media of dance.

A. The Media of Dance

The goal here is to specify the nature of the existence of dance - what it consists of. This is an important matter. We must know what dance is in order to be able to explain how we related to it, how we can know anything about it, talk about it, refer to it, or evaluate it. To take an extreme example, if dance is only a mental thing, existing in the minds of interested observers, then it is difficult to explain how a group of persons could perceive it, discuss it, and agree or disagree on its value. If dance is held to consist only of, say, physical movement, but not the auditory phenomenon of music, then it is difficult to explain why and how we frequently discuss and evaluate the musical dimension of a dance performance.

Specifying the media of dance is easily confused with defining dance. Defining dance is an exercise that not only examines the medium of the phenomenon but other criteria by which dance can be distinguished from similar phenomenon. Perhaps one problem with some of the definitions examined in the previous chapter is a preoccupation with specifying the medium. As shown, other artforms may share the medium of

dance; mime, for example, seems to share the medium of human movement with dances-in-silence. Similarly, dance may share the media of the non-art event of walking across the room with a radio playing, yet dance can be distinguished through a definition that involves the context of appreciation and evaluation for the observers. Thus, it is possible for two distinct artforms to share the same medium, and for an artform and some other non-art phenomenon to share the same medium, but to be distinguished through definition by additional considerations.

Determining the media of dance is also different from specifying the aesthetic object, or proper object of criticism, because of the difference in the purpose of the question being asked. What is relevant for evaluation is a narrower issue than what is the existence of something we describe, interpret, perceive, relate to, and have other sorts of knowledge about. Ontological status is relevant to evaluation as well as a variety of other things.

Determining ontological status is also different from establishing identity. Identity involves ways of individuating individual works and performances and determining sameness of two performances as the same work. Ontological status is relevant to identity. If some proposed medium is not part of the existence of the thing, then it is difficult to see how that medium could be relevant to establishing identity and vice versa. But it is obviously possible to determine that two phenomena share the same media without

their being the same work.

The primary test for the adequacy of an ontological theory is, as with definition, whether a proposal reflects the way we actually talk about the existence of dance in the real world (as opposed to a misleading sense of existence merely in the fact that we can talk about it).

Thomas Munro, in his 1949 study, The Arts and Their Interrelations, (1) discusses various ways in which the media of different artforms have been classified. If medium is considered ". . . in a strictly physical sense, as the kind of matter out of which a work is made" (2) different artworks can be categorized by their use of oil, clay, and so forth. The arts can also be characterized in terms of the "raw materials" used, that is, the ". . . materials in a comparatively crude, unprocessed state, before the artist has organized them." (3) Munro recognizes that "the idea of 'rawness' is always somewhat relative, expressing a contrast between the material as a particular artist begins to use it, and as he finished it." (4) Munro also recognizes that this way of categorizing is overly elaborate and not very informative.

In another approach, he notes, ". . . the concept of physical medium is often made to include instruments and tools," (5) such as the sculptor's chisel, or the musician's piano. This approach, applied to dance, might mean that the medium of dance includes everything from toe shoes and resin to stage and classroom barre. Munro does not discuss this,

but it seems a needlessly confusing and uninformative approach. The tools used by artists are a very diverse group of things, which vary considerably from person to person, and do not tell us much that is useful about the end result of the creative process. Further, it would be misleading to place so much weight on the method of creation.

For dance, Munro says, the principal physical medium is the human body, including "the appearance, manner, voice and personality of the performer" which ". . . are vital parts of the medium on which the . . . choreographer has to depend." (6) By including what he calls "psychological state" along with physical ones, Munro unnecessarily introduces cumbersome complications. A dancer need not actually be sad to convey sadness, and being sad does not guarantee that sadness will be effectively conveyed to an audience. Rather, the dancer must be able to use his body in complex ways which will convey sadness, regardless of his psychological states at the time of performance. Again, it will be more fruitful in understanding how we relate to dance to be precise about the significant medium.

Munro is not preoccupied with isolating a single medium for each artform. Although he believes each artform has a "principal" medium, he also acknowledges that "Every art uses more than one physical material, even when it emphasizes one in particular and is named after it." (7) For Munro, "the primary physical medium" of dance ". . . is the living body with its power of movement," but he also includes as

media "costume and other accessories" which ". . . contribute greatly to the total effect," along with ". . . the rhythmic and usually musical sound accompaniment" and "lighting." (8) Unfortunately, Munro does not explore or discuss the implications of his sweeping, inclusive approach to identifying the medium of dance. His all-inclusiveness seems based, not on an analysis of the purpose of identifying a medium, but simply on his tendency to the most far-reaching inclusiveness, as seen earlier in his approach to definition. One purpose of this chapter is to try to show that this inclusiveness is indeed justifiable as the best way to understand dance. As noted, the medium of any artform is relevant to understanding how we relate to it and evaluate it. Applications of the multiple media developed here are thus discussed in some detail with regard to evaluation of dance.

Dance is often identified for convenience as the artform of human movement, and no one would disagree that movement plays some important role in the artform. However, the interest in distinguishing dance from other artforms seems to have led some to wrongly characterize dance as an artform consisting solely of human movement, or at least to ignore everything but human movement. Haig Khatchadourian, for example, has argued that dance wholly consists of or includes physical movements, although not bodies in motion. (9) "Physical (bodily) movements" are ". . . the physical medium of a dance, . . ." while ". . . bodies, which are physical

though living entities, are not part of a dance." (10) I have no quarrel with his insistence on some physical medium of dance, although his rejection of physical bodies (in motion) as part or all of that medium rests on a questionable analysis of the actual usage of words like "dance." Words like "painting," "sculpture," and "work of architecture," he says, have two distinct descriptive senses, as "(1) some physical object or set of objects, a physical activity or set of activities, a sequence of sounds, and so on," and "(2) 'images' or perceptual (visual or auditory) forms or patterns created by physical materials: pigments on canvas, metal on wood, clay and so on." (11) In contrast, he claims, words like "dance," "ballet," "play," "pantomime," "music," and "poem" have only the second descriptive sense. However, these supposedly single sense terms can be and are used to refer to strictly physical objects and activities, just as "painting" can be used to refer to a physical object: "Tell the moving man to put that painting in Room Two;" "Tell the stage manager that tonight's ballet needs a stage of 40' x 60';" "Last night's ballet weakened the stage here in the corner;" "The ballet ran two full hours;" "Cunningham's new dance cost $50,000;" "Where ;did the cleaning man put my music after last night's performance?" More importantly, it is not clear that the single or dual nature of such terms proves anything about the medium of the artform. If the analysis of actual usage did prove that the physical medium of dance cannot be physical bodies because "dance" is never

used to refer to physical objects or activities, it is not clear why it would not follow that the medium of dance cannot be physical movements either, but only some mental or virtual entity.

An even more basic flaw in Khatchadourian's insistence on physical movement as the sole medium of dance is that it ignores other important aspects of a performance, at considerable loss of explanatory power. He neglects non-movement, for example; although not a fatal omission, it is an error which can and should be corrected. Dancers often assume perfectly motionless poses, not just when they stand at the side while other dancers perform, but actually during a dance sequence or variation. (12) A female ballet dancer often strikes a pose, such as an arabesque, and holds the pose absolutely motionless for seconds, if unsupported, or much longer, if supported by her partner. It is not clear how such a pose is characterized as part of the dance if the physical medium of dance is strictly physical movement. It makes sense to talk about a non-moving body, but not about non-moving movement. A precise description of a particular dance, using Khatchadourian's concept of dance as wholly physical movement, would describe only the physical movements, but not the stillness. If dance consists wholly of the physical movement, then the absence of movement is the absence of dance.

He says, "There can be no dances without physical movement; consequently a completely motionless figure in some

particular posture or pose on a stage cannot constitute the performance of a dance." (13) (Choreographer and dancer Paul Taylor did, in fact, once present just such an event. (14)) Although physical movement is at least a major part of the phenomenon of dance, it is less clear that dance is wholly physical movement or that a particular dance must include any movement. If the motionless dancer made a fist during his time on stage, does the fist-making constitute movement and thus a dance? Using Khatchadourian's approach, the fist-making and only the fist-making is the dance, but the audience might in fact see the fist-making and the time of motionlessness as a performance making an unusual statement about the importance in dance of movement or the frustration for a dancer of remaining motionless, or it might be seen as a virtuoso exhibition of the muscle control necessary to maintain perfect motionlessness for a length of time. Such demonstrations could also be effected without even the fist-making, casting a shadow of doubt on any claim that every single performance of a dance must include some movement.

Non-movement can result from the absence of a body capable of movement (the stage is empty), the presence of a body which is simply not moving (the dancer is not raking leaves), negative doing (the dancer is thinking, but not moving), or an intentional refraining from doing (the dancer is maintaining a still pose). The latter, intentional motionlessness, is an important part of the movement design

and can be called "stasis" to distinguish it from other types of non-movement. This intentional motionlessness describes Taylor's phenomenon, and, arguably, might be dance. At the very least, Taylor's work is different, in some important ways, from an empty stage.

To account for stillness and the experiments of people like Taylor with non-moving dances, I would suggest that the medium of dance be understood, in part, as patterns of physical movement and stasis by a human body capable of such movement. (The pattern in Taylor's work would include the location of the dancer on stage, the time of stasis, and the particular posture assumed.)

Music is another important dimension of dance performances that is obscured in Khatchadourian's analysis, in which he acknowledges only that rhythm must be present "in some degree" in dance. (15) A few rhythmical dances without music do exist, but this is extraordinarily rare, a fact not without significance. Especially in the masterful collaborations of Balanchine and Stravinsky, the music is as much a part of the performance of "the dance" as the movement. If the choreography for Balanchine's Concerto Barocco were performed to a Sousa march instead of Bach's Double Violin Concerto, it simply would not be a performance of Concerto Barocco, although a performance using a piano transcription of the Bach would probably still be considered Concerto Barocco. (16) Although "rhythmical" qualifies and characterizes movement, "music" does not. It does not make sense to

describe movement performed in silence as "musical," although it does to describe it as "rhythmical." A characterization of movement as "musical" is, instead, used to characterize the relationship between the media of movement and of music.

There is disagreement about how important music is to dance, (17) or what things about music are most important ("mood," rhythm, etc.), but music clearly plays a major role in dance performances, second only to the movement itself. The few examples of dances without music are, I would contend, highly rhythmical works, (18) parasitic on music and the audience's familiarity with the use of music in dance. They are often experiments designed precisely to show the possibility of dance without music, (19) much as Taylor's experiment attempted to show the possibility of dance without human movement. But despite the long history of dances-without-music, they remain isolated and rare examples. One need only look at the short history of the artform of dance to confirm this. To explain dance, philosophy must look to dance as it is actually performed and appreciated.

The view that the medium of dance is solely human movement (or bodies) relegates music to the status of a mere dispensable accompaniment, excluded from any proper or important role in the evaluation or identity of dance performances, like the pedestal for a sculpture or the frame and wall hooks for a painting. This is the unacceptable consequence of Khatchadourian's analysis, and also of Virgil

Aldrich's view ". . . that the material of the art of dancing is the body-in-action of the dancer." (20) Although Aldrich says this medium will be "elaborated" by the "involvement" of "temporal and rhythmic elements," (21) he does not consider these elements to be the material (or one of the materials) of dance, nor does he so consider music. ("Dancing is usually done to music, and is then an impure art, a mixture of two arts." (22))

George Beiswanger suggests a more integral role for music when he says that

musical accompaniment builds into the dance's designs, providing in some cases the dance's initial inspiration and basic framework, adding to others a supplementary contrapuntal pattern, and affording still others a tonal floor upon which the design's dynamics can securely play. (23)

Movement designs are intentional patterns, structures, and formalities, both in the sense of visual designs perceived at one moment in time (relationship of limb to torso; relationship of dancer to dancer) and designs which can be perceived only through a period of time (relationship of one body position to subsequent body position and relationship of dancer to dancer in location in space at succeeding moments in time). Thus, it is clear, building on Beiswanger's observation, why music and rhythms are so integral in dance, as they provide, reinforce, highlight, and focus through aural patterns the relationships of the visual patterns.

Although it is far beyond the scope of this dissertation to attempt an analysis of Joseph Margolis' major

theories of artworks as cultural entities in Art and Philosophy, (24) it is worth noting that he discusses the medium of dance in terms only of movement, omitting any mention of other media in dance performances. He says, for example, that ". . . a dance is embodied in physical movements, but it is itself a system of articulated dance steps." (25) He makes no claim that he is comprehensively analyzing the medium of dance but this brief remark illustrates a common tendency to ignore other characteristics of dance.

Similarly, in what he describes as "tentative and exploratory reflections," (26) Monroe Beardsley has analyzed dance movement in terms of philosophical action theory, but the next step needed would be application of the approach to the other media of the artform. He says that "mathematically ordered motion (i.e., pulse and rhythm which together form meter)" "may be a very useful criterion of dancehood," but "cannot" be taken "as a necessary or sufficient condition." (27) His reason, however, seems to be that this would be too narrow as a way of distinguishing mere motion from the moving of dance. But he does not seem to be claiming that a specific sort of movement is necessarily the only medium of the artform of dance, but rather that the pulse and rhythm do not adequately distinguish dance movement from non-dance movement.

The music could, for example, be analyzed analogously to the movement in Beardsley's analysis. It is claimed here that the music should not merely be considered as noises or

sounds heard at the same time as a dance performance. Certain noises also constitute a musical work, say Swan Lake, and also constitute one of the media of a performance of a ballet called Swan Lake. Blowing on a flute causes a sound, that is, generates a sound. "Sortal generation" also seems applicable in explaining music, that is, "act-generation that occurs when an action of one sort becomes also . . . an action of another sort - without . . . ceasing to be an action of the first sort as well." (28) Applying this to music, making a certain sound on a flute is also playing a part of Swan Lake, but can also in appropriate circumstances have the character of a ballet performance. Not every sound, not every playing of Swan Lake has the character of a ballet performance. When sound is expressive, following Beardsley's analysis, it is music. When the perceptual phenomena of movement and sound are expressive, it is dance.

Before looking further at candidates for the physical medium of dance, an entirely different approach should be disposed o f, that of Susanne Langer that dance is not physical at all, but a virtual image. Although physical materials (bodies, costumes, light, music tone, etc.) are used to create dance, she says, dance is none of those things, nor any physical thing, but an "appearance" or "apparition of active powers, a dynamic image." (29) Khatchadourian sums up widespread rejection of this view: "I do not see how such 'virtual entities' can exist independently of a perceiver." (30)

At the other extreme is the view that dance consists of more than one physical medium, physical movement (or bodies-in-motion), as well as music, costumes, scenery, and lighting. But I would not go so far as to say that the physical medium of dance is a fusion or assimilation of these media.

In a brief note, some time ago, Beardsley hinted at such a possibility: ". . . it would seem that in the dance a fusion of music and the movement of human bodies can occur." (31) He did not elaborate on this idea, but there is a certain attractiveness to considering the medium of dance to be one thing, a fusion of movement-and-music (and perhaps other things). This approach fully acknowledges the diverse elements of dance in a way that the Khatchadourian-Aldrich approach does not, and recognizes that dance is more than merely the sum of those diverse elements. Yet the idea if troublesome, because fusion (defined in the Oxford English Dictionary) as "The union or blending together of different things [whether material or immaterial] as if by melting, so as to form one whole; the result or state of being so blended" (32)) suggests too much, even assuming it is used metaphorically. Two movement vocabularies can be fused (say, the classical styles of Petipa and Fokine); the music of two composers can be fused into the score for one ballet; the sound of the human voice can be fused to the sound of instrumental music. But when physical movement and auditory images are "fused," the whole produced is not really fused, but mixed, with the separate elements still clearly present.

No new element is created, although a new mixture certainly is. In watching a dance performance, it is impossible to forget - nor should it be forgotten - that it consists of movement and music and various other things. Substituting amalgamation ("The action of combining distinct elements, races, associations, into one uniform whole; . . . a homogeneous union of what were previously distinct elements, societies, etc." (33)) for fusion results in the same inaccuracy.

The notion of "assimilation," introduced by Langer for purposes other than characterizing the medium of dance, is equally unsatisfactory. As examples of a "principle of assimilation," she says,

<,BLOCKQUOTE> Music ordinarily swallows words and actions creating opera, oratorio or song; dance commonly assimilates music . . . sometimes a poem may swallow music, or even dance . . . . I have never known music to incorporate dancing, but it might. (34)

Langer was not here addressing the medium of dance, but these tantalizing comments are worth exploring from that perspective. While fusion is the blending of several things into a new whole, assimilation ("the action of making or becoming like; similarity, resemblance, likeness" (35)) involves changes in one or more things to become like something else, which itself remains unchanged. It is not clear how music could change to be like dance, since music already has rhythm, mood, tempo, etc. independently. If the assimilation of music by dance just means that dance dominates the music in being more important in the interest and attention of

perceivers, "assimilation" would overstate the relationship.

The problem underlying the approaches just surveyed is the apparent assumption that a particular artform must have only one medium. Langer, for example, says quite explicitly: "Every work has its being in only one order of art; compositions of different orders are not simply conjoined, but all except one will cease to appear as what they are." (36) Aldrich, like many others, talks as if the complexity or "impurity" of dance is a flaw to be overcome. It is not clear why there must be a single medium for each artform, except for the usual preference for simplicity, all else being equal, and the greater familiarity with major arts which are, of course, pure.

Thomas Munro, writing some thirty years ago, seemed to glorify the presence of so many different media within ballet, specifically in the work The Afternoon of a Faun. He describes the work as

. . . a product of several constituent works of art in different media - a poem, a musical composition, a dance, drawings, paintings, costumes, stage settings, and all the other elements which contribute to a theatrical spectacle. (37)

He also refers to the work as "a single compound work of art, a ballet . . . an excellent example of cooperation and synthesis among different arts," (38) ". . . a complex work of art. . . ," (39) and ". . . a compound form. . . ." (40) Faun is not a typical example of a work of dance, however, as Munro discusses, as there is a long history of the separate treatment of the theme by artists in different artforms working

quite independently. Only some time later were various contributions "merged" by Diaghileff into one work. (41) In many other dances, the theme and music may pre-exist the creation of the ballet, but there are rarely separately existing works in all the media.

Munro addresses the issue of whether complex artforms such as ballet ". . . are the better for being thus complex and many-sided." (42) He identifies several factors which account for the apparent preference for simpler, purer, single-media artforms, including greater ease in following the work, being able to "perceive all the stimuli in one way, with less distraction," (43) and the ability to appreciate the work ". . . without accompanying words or music, which . . . only confuse and distract without enhancing the value of the whole." (44) These factors, with which Munro does not necessarily agree, sound like a simple matter of greater ease, but could also be understood as a disagreement over the value of simplicity as opposed to complexity. More precisely, this seems to be a disagreement over preferable varieties of complexity - complexity from elements within a particular media or complexity resulting from the presence of different media. This sort of disagreement suggests why it is important to properly identify and analyze the media of the artform. As long as dance is treated as a single-medium form of human movement the remaining media cannot be accommodated except in negative ways, as clutter, distractions, or impurities.

I thus propose, quite simply, that dance be considered a multi-media artform with media of unequal importance. A primary medium of dance is physical movement and non-movement in the sense of statis, by a human body capable of such movement. This is the most obvious characteristic of dance, and the characteristic that distinguishes it most sharply from other artforms. Paintings may represent the human body but it is not physically present in a painting. Theater, mime, and opera also use live human bodies capable of movement, but in all cases the movement is presented along with other media that distinguish them from dance. Even a Taylor non-moving dance counts as a dance here, as it uses human bodies capable of movement in a pattern of stasis requiring muscular effort by the persons to hold the position.

The other primary medium of dance is music (or, more generally, auditory images), which play a major role, but a less important one than the movement. Every dance either includes music, or auditory images (percussion or other rhythmic noises), or uses clearly developed rhythms in the movement, exploiting the audience's familiarity with music in other works. The vast majority of dances centrally use music, and the handful of experimental works which do not themselves audibly use music can be included as examples of dance because of this parasitic or dependent role. Works which have no such relationship to music (its presence or its rhythm) do not count as dance. The important role of music distinguishes dance from theater and mime, which also

use movements of the human body but without any such integral role for music. Opera is distinguished by its use of music produced by the human voice. It should also be noted that primary need not mean "sole;" there are three primary colors, for example.

Secondary media include remaining objects of visual perception (all except the movement design itself), such as costumes, scenery, lighting, and such experimental innovations as videotape. Very simple costumes, such as plain leotards, play a minimal role in importance both in perception and evaluation, but others, such as the lavishly decorated costumes for The Firebird, are (speaking colloquially) works of art in themselves and constitute a visual dimension quite distinct from the perception of the human movement. Some scenery, especially by such artists as Picasso and Chagall, (45) constitutes a separate artistic medium presented on the same stage and as part of the same performance with the movement and music. These are characterized as secondary media, because an instance of dance could exist without them (assuming nudity in fact or in appearance through the use of flesh-colored leotards, and an unembellished performing space and lighting), because these media are shared with several other artforms and do not particularly characterize dance, and because they are of secondary importance in understanding and evaluating dance. For example, it is commonplace for critics to complain of Balanchine's shoddy or garish costumes, for this is noted as an annoyance, not

as a decisive factor against the value of the work overall.

This proposal rejects attempts to identify one and only one medium of the artform of dance. But I also want to insist that dance is more than just a collaboration of other artforms, temporarily uprooted and assembled in an uneasy, impure partnership. Beiswanger suggests that; ". . . a well-designed dance is not to be resolved into its fragmented parts." (46) It is not the case that the contributions of individual media should "stand on their own" as separate works of art. It is also not the case, however, that the components must constitute an absolute fusion of those parts, for they can be and are separately identified, analyzed, and compared.

The multiplicity of media makes dance more difficult to understand, but there is nothing inferior about complexity, other things being unequal. My proposal, although not as neat and simple as competitors, seems more suited to understanding dance as it is actually created and performed, the ultimate test of the adequacy of any theory.

B. Evaluation of the Mixed Media of Dance

Overall assessments of dance performances are justified, in part, by analyzing and evaluating the individual media of a performance. Evaluations of individual components in a dance performance need not necessarily and sometimes should not be the same as if each were being evaluated within the context of the pure artform using only that medium. A particular perceptual phenomenon in dance (such as the music)

might be judged good, while precisely the same phenomenon in the context of a different artform (say, a musical concert) might be much less or much more good.

One long-standing debate is whether the music in a dance performance should be evaluated as if it were being performed in a concert hall. The view that it should be may have been reinforced by the practical reality that many American publications have used music critics to review dance, as until recently the full-time services of dance critics were not needed. Several dance critics have held that the evaluation of music in a dance performance demands special principles appropriate to the complex nature of dance, (47) as does evaluation of the dramatic elements of a dance performance. (48) Special standards for the evaluation of the various components of a complex artform are defensible. At the least, the burden of proof rests with showing that the principles for evaluation of X should be identical to those for evaluation of X-as-a-component-of-Y. Even in the pure forms of music performed in a concert hall, precisely the same critical considerations would not be used in evaluating a solo performer and a member of a symphony orchestra.

Some have suggested that the standards for the individual media in dance performances are actually inferior to those of pure artforms. Critic George Borodin, for example, claims that

. . . if it were possible to obtain music

with the genius of a Beethoven in it, and decors designed by an artist of the stature of a Rembrandt, and if one fitted them to the dance, the net results would almost certainly be very bad ballet - though those who want merely to listen to the orchestra or to gaze at the settings as one looks at a picture would, no doubt, come away with the idea that they had seen a great ballet at last. (49)

Further, he notes,

. . . music which seems exactly right when performed as part of the ballet for which it is written fails often to please in the concert hall, except in so far as it rouses memories in those who have seen the ballet. (50)

Critic Cyril Beaumont also suggests that music for dance is inferior to that of the concert hall:

. . . the more intellectually satisfying and the more completely expressive a piece of music, the less readily it lends itself to choreographic illustration. . . . (51)

These anomalies are not resolved by simply noting that the whole is more than, or at least different from, the sum of the parts. (52) They suggest that dance is a lesser artform because music that would otherwise be inferior is best for certain dance performances, or because music otherwise excellent is bad for a dance performance. Does an artform using several different artists necessarily result in products inferior to those produced by individual artists? (53) Does dance, instead of expanding upon or expressing music, in fact inhibit it?

The anomalies are resolvable because the value of the perceptual phenomenon of medium X depends not only on its value in isolation, but also in relation to the entire dance

performance. Some general principle is needed for relating the value of each medium to the dance performance overall, and the contribution, either negative or positive, that an individual component makes to the performance as a whole. Measuring an individual component of dance against the totality of which it is a part is problematic and possibly question-begging, however. Even though a dance performance is, in a sense, a "whole" or "unity," it consists of distinct perceptual phenomena appealing to several senses. It is difficult to specify the unity of a given performance, without reference to the component parts and thus without drawing a conclusion about the value of the very component in question.

A more manageable approach is "piecemeal" evaluation of the performance, in the sense of evaluating, not each component separately and independently, but the relationships between a certain few of the components. The key standard for these relationships, used extensively by critics and philosophers alike, is "appropriateness." Beardsley suggests, for example, that one problem in analyzing the relationship between dance movement and music is whether ". . . one music [can] be more appropriate to (a better 'interpretation' of) a musical composition than another." (54) Elsewhere, he says that ". . . the existence of such an art [dance-with-music] depends on the possibility of perceived correspondence between the patterns of music and the patterns of music and the patterns of bodily movement." (55)

The question, then, is what types of factors make one aspect of a performance more or less appropriate to others. Appropriateness could be a simple, pragmatic matter. Costumes would be appropriate if they leave the dancers free to execute the choreography without encumbrance. Scenery could be inappropriate if it takes up too much space and crowds the dancers. Appropriateness could also describe visual harmony: is the setting visually harmonious with the costuming or do they clash uncomfortably? Appropriateness could also describe balance: does the scenery provide a pleasing background without visually overpowering the dancers' movements? The importance of balance between the choreography and dramatic action has been noted by philosophers. Gilson criticizes dance in which ". . . dramatic action, losing sight of the prerequisite of music, imposes on the dance tasks beyond its means." (56) Aldrich says that a dance with "literary or programmatic content" can still be "a great work of art," "[a]s long as it is composed and performed in a manner that does not distract attention from the content to the subject matter outside the dance. . ." (57) Appropriateness of dramatic aspects can mean balance and consistency between dramatic action or theme and the choreography, the dancer's interpretation, or the music. (58)

Munro notes one sense of "appropriateness," as ". . . perfect consistency of style. . ." (59) among different media in the work. He notes, though without agreement or disagreement, a nineteenth century belief that there are

"'correspondences' between the arts, and also . . . correspondences between the senses," (60) and that "It should be possible, accordingly, to translate an emotion or a mood from painting into poetry, or vice versa." (61) however, this notion of "translation" of the same emotion or mood from medium to medium seems obviously an overly simply conclusion from a very general observation that the arts are in some sense "languages." some concepts simply cannot be translated into some media. The concept of mother-in-law, for example, is a favorite example of something which cannot be conveyed in dance.

Munro expresses apparent agreement with a different standard of appropriateness, noting that ". . . the presence of competing stylistic influences may serve to add interest, while it weakens those values which arise from perfect unity," (62) thus implying that complexity in the sense of diversity of style can offset deficiencies in unity.

Munro also hints at another sense of appropriateness, namely, that "each constituent act must select for emphasis certain aspects of the theme, with which it is competent to deal." (63)

Both in theory and in critical practice, there is thus considerable disagreement over what constitutes "appropriateness." Even if there is agreement on synonyms for "appropriateness" ("unity," "consistency," "balance"), applications of that understanding vary widely, as critics disagree about which phenomena warrant those characteriza-

tions. This problem, true of all artforms, is especially apparent in a multi-media one.

Disagreement over the meaning of "appropriateness" is sharpest regarding the relationship of music to human movement. The position most familiar to twentieth-century audiences, that music and dance should be integrally related both rhythmically and dramatically, was espoused as a radical innovation by the eighteenth-century critic, Jean-George Noverre:

. . . the dance music . . . fixes and determines the dancer's movements and actions. He must therefore . . . render it intelligible by the force and vivacity of his gestures, by the lively and animated expression of his features; consequently dancing with action is the instrument, or organ, by which the thoughts expressed in the music are rendered appropriately and intelligibly. (64)

This view, shared by many critics since Noverre, is exemplified in ballet as diverse as Giselle, noted for its musically expressed dramatic themes, (65) and the works of George Balanchine, where dance is a sophisticated visualization or embodiment of the music. (66) This sense of "appropriateness" was not universally accepted, however, and Michel Fokine, the Russian choreographer, felt compelled to again stress its importance in his famous "five principles" in 1914. (67)

In the nineteenth century, many still thought that appropriateness consisted mainly of having a "strong beat" to which the dancers could keep time. A few twentieth-century writers still seem to hold the simplistic idea that one of the most important things about music is how well it

gives the dancers a "beat" to follow. (68) The problems with this view are obvious. Dancers, today, with a more sophisticated understanding of music, can dance to rhythms considerably more subtle than those of previous generations, and audience, likewise, are more sophisticated. Many contemporary dances use music lacking a "beat" in any straight-forward sense, such as music by John Cage. If a strong beat were the most important thing about dance music, Sousa marches and Strauss waltzes would be much more popular for dance than they are.

Another nineteenth-century view of "appropriateness," rejected and now enjoying a resurgence, is that music should serve primarily as a mood-setting background to the movement and not be distracting. Some in the avant-garde have returned to the view that music should play such a minimal background role. (69) Merce Cunningham has gone to the extreme of insisting that movement and music should have no relationship whatsoever. (70) this could be understood as a rejection of "appropriateness" between music and dance as relevant to evaluating dance, or as a negative sense of "appropriateness," that music with no rhythmic or emotional relationship to the movement is most appropriate for dance. Cunningham seems to be interested in developing the potential of movement itself, independently of the usual dramatic or emotional associations, but in doing so he makes dance almost indistinguishable from sport or other non-art. Design of movement by itself does not constitute art, although

his retention of the spectator-performer conventions may salvage some status as performing art.

At the other extreme, Ruth St. Denis, a modern dance pioneer, promoted "music visualization," a very close, mirror-like relationship between music and movement,

. . . the scientific translation into bodily action of the rhythmic, melodic and harmonic structure of a musical composition, without intention to in any way "interpret" or reveal any hidden meaning apprehended by the dance. (71)

Choreography by Doris Humphrey, a disciple of St. Denis, was recently criticized for this close relationship:

Doris Humphrey's choreography was always very closely linked to music - probably too closely for there is a metronomic ordinariness to her dance phrasing that lacks musical flexibility or even sensitivity. (72)

In striking disagreement, another contemporary critic praised a work by Hans Van Manen for precisely this close parallel:

Manen's choreography is wonderfully apt for the music, the dancers matching every phrase with appropriate arm or leg movements in the fugue, growing or receding in strength as does the music. (73)

The disagreement could result from either a different understanding of what constitutes "music visualization" or from differing views on its value. Cohen has criticized extreme senses of "appropriateness," including that of St. Denis:

The relationship [between music and dance] must be clearly perceivable, yet not so simple that it offers no challenge to the intelligent observer . . . [St. Denis'] [m]usic visualization did not last. It was not interesting. It said the same things as the music and nothing more. It made no

comment. A dance that moves constantly against the music is almost as dull. The right mean will be judged relatively to other factors, which include the complexity of both the musical score and the movement. (74)

"Appropriateness" can thus be grounds for criticizing both the extreme of no relationship or similarity and too much similarity.

Similar disagreement exists concerning the appropriateness of the emotion expressed through movement and through music. One extreme view is again that of Cunningham, who so wants to avoid having movement express any emotion that may be suggested by the music that he has created choreography completely independently from the music being composed by John Cage for the dance. Cunningham and Cage would agree on some basic beat and a duration, but ". . . how music and choreography meet at any particular moment is left to chance." (75) Since Cunningham is interested in the potential of pure movement itself, it would be more consistent for him to reject all use of music and then experiment with the emotions which can still be expressed through the movement alone or whether pure movement can be designed which is free of all emotion.

A less extreme view, that the movement should not attempt to relate specifically to the music, was held by the pioneering modern dancer and choreographer Mary Wigman, who wrote, regarding her choreography for Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps:

Could I have said more than Stravinsky had already expressed in his grandiose music? Certainly not. Then I would have to leave the lead to the music and subordinate the dance creation to it. This, of course, meant to relinquish completely all attempts at painting and illustrating the subtleties and colorful shadings of the music through the dance. (76)

Another unorthodox view is Isadora Duncan's, that music is a "motivator," but not something to be "interpreted" or "expressed." (77)

These examples illustrate the use of "appropriateness" as a principle for evaluating the various media in a dance performance. Dance criticism must also, of course, consider harmony, unity, or appropriateness within each medium considered separately (e.g., are the human movements harmonious with each other?), but it cannot be limited to these intra-media evaluations without ignoring the full complexity of the performance. Appropriateness among the various media of a complex artform is a special variety of the problem of what constitutes harmony or unity in a single-medium artform.

"Appropriateness," complexity, or unity cannot be analyzed, however, without first determining the medium or media of the artform of dance. If dance is considered to consist solely of movement with mere accompaniments from other media, then the critical standards of "appropriateness" must be analyzed in terms of how well those other media accompany movement. If dance is held to consist of several media, of varying importance, appropriateness can be more fully developed in terms of the relationships of those

various media. Thus, one important "pay-off" of specifying the ontological status of a work of art in dance is clarification needed to analyze specific critical standards.

Another question arising in a complex artform is how important the value of a particular medium is to the overall value of the work. Questions regarding the evaluation of the goodness of particular components have just been surveyed; next, questions are considered regarding the importance of those individual value assessments to the overall assessment of the performance. Human movement is obviously the most important medium, but how important is the quality of music, costumes, and scenery? (78) Does the value of the music outweigh that of mime passages or scenery? (How does a performance in which the music is very poor and the scenery and costumes very good compare in value with one in which the scenery and costumes are very poor, but the music is very good?)

I would suggest that the importance of the various media of dance coincides with the hierarchy of media discussed earlier: (1) movement, (2) music, and (3) visual dimensions of scenery, costumes, and lighting. Within each of these media, the primacy of human movement and the independence of dance as an artform dictate a further hierarchy of values.

For example, there has historically been considerable disagreement over the relative importance of dramatic quality ("expression") as opposed to the quality of the movement

itself ("technique" or "virtuosity"). Even during the time of Noverre,

the classicists condemn[ed] the predominance of dramatic emotion over consideration of form; the dramatic choreographers repl[ied] that pure dancing is out of touch with life and human problem . . . . Noverre refused to admit that there is any opposition between pure dancing and expressive movement, claiming that dancing, like the other arts, can and should solve the problem of balance between matter and manner. (79)

The major reformers in dance, including Fokine and Noverre, have tried to balance these two major elements, (80) but the disagreement as to their relative importance continues today. Early modern dance reformers re-emphasized the dramatic element, and an over-emphasis on technique to the exclusion of expressive qualities has been widely criticized in the twentieth-century. (81) As noted earlier, some in today's avant-garde have swung to the other extreme of complete rejection of emotion and all dramatic elements in favor of "pure movement." (82)

This dispute illustrates the debate (discussed in Chapter II) over whether dance is primarily a theatrical, dramatic vehicle, using human movement as a medium, or primarily a separate artform of human movement, which can also convey a dramatic element. The former view can be criticized for misplaced emphasis on the dramatic element, at the expense of exploring the full potential of human movement in the independent artform of dance. The avant-garde, who reject emotional content to explore the potential of move-

ment freed of emotion, can also be criticized for short-changing the potential of that movement to express many things, including human emotion. In these lines of argument, for which there are no simple answers, the key factors are the extent to which human movement is central in the performance, the full potential of that movement is developed, and dance is recognized as an independent artform.

The hierarchy of media (movement, music, visual dimensions) helps clarify the relative value of the decor, the scenery and the props, and the costuming. (83) Traditional thinking, as expressed by Fokine, is that

Ballet should reflect an active and equal cooperation of all the arts involved in it; music, scenery, dancing, costuming, all were crucial to a unified creative effort. (84)

Russian impresario Serge Diaghileff, founder and manager of the Ballets Russe de Monte Carlo in the early twentieth century, represents the extreme of letting the value of the costuming and especially the decor overshadow the dancing itself. Although his expressed view was in agreement with Fokine that the dance performance must be a thorough integration of all components, many critics charged that in fact he was more interested in the visual element of human movement. (85) Pablo Picasso himself designed stage settings and costumes for Diaghileff's company. (86) Designs by such artists as Marc Chagall (87) and Salvador Dali (88) in later years also encouraged an over-emphasis on the value of scenery and costuming. Today, critics agree that too much emphasis on

scenery and costumes, at the expense of the human movement, detracts from the overall quality of the work. (89)

Critic Arnold Haskell presented arguments in 1938 which, while not as extreme as Diaghileff, still place far more emphasis on decor and costumes than do critics today. He denied what he considered the then-popular view, ". . . that costumes and decor are merely an embellishment," (90) insisting instead that

. . . costumes is very closely linked with the actual choreography itself, since it is physically a part of the dancer. Costume intensifies the atmosphere dramatically and so assists the narration. Decor must show up the detail and pattern of the choreography. Decor must parallel the music and movement. (91)

Although examples of his view can still be found in evaluations of contemporary productions of nineteenth century classics, (92) Haskell underestimates the potential of human movement itself for expressing dramatic elements and fails to recognize the independence of the artform of dance from the art of the theater.

At the other extreme from Diaghileff and Haskell are contemporary choreographers, including Balanchine, who often use almost no scenery at all and practice clothes for costuming. (93) Critical standards, as well as economics, have encouraged this trend to parsimony. Balanchine is reported to believe that ". . . nothing should interfere or distract from the purpose of ballet - the vision of the body dancing." (94) some of the early modern reformers also reportedly

objected to excesses in scenery and costuming on moral grounds. (95) Philosopher Joanna Friesen summarizes current thinking that, while costumes, lighting, and sets can enhance a performance, they remain of secondary importance:

. . . technical competence in the choice and arrangement of these elements, although imperative to the final perceptual product, cannot sustain the dance form alone. (96)

But a secondary role is still a role important in its way. To understand dance as it is actually performed and appreciated, it is essential that all its various media be fully acknowledged and understood.

NOTES

(1) (Cleveland: Press of Western Reserve University, 1967) [originally published 1949]. Return to text

(2) Ibid., p. 247. Return to text

(3) Ibid. Return to text

(4) Ibid., pp. 247-8. Return to text

(5) Ibid., p. 248. Return to text

(6) Ibid., p. 249. Return to text

(7) Ibid. Return to text

(8) Ibid., p. 495. Return to text

(9) "Movement and Action in the Performing Arts," JAAC, XXXVII (Fall, 1978), 25, 27. Return to text

(10) Ibid., 27, 31. Return to text

(11) Ibid., 27. Return to text

(12) For a detailed account of the importance to dance of the maintenance of specific postures, see G. B. Strauss, "The Aesthetics of Dominance," JAAC, XXXVII (Fall, 1978), 73-9. Strauss analyzes dance ". . . as having three elements or aspects - those of posture (the shape of the image), those of architecture (the image as it related to space), and those of motion (the rhythms and quality of energy used by the image as it moves from one posture to another in space)." Ibid., 73. Return to text

(13) Khatchadourian, "Movement and Action in the Performing Arts," 27. Return to text

(14) Supra, Chapter II, note 106. Return to text

(15) Khatchadourian, "Movement and Action in the Performing Arts," 27. Return to text

(16) Similarly, use of the same music with a different movement design would be a different work. See Anna Kisselgoff's very detailed analysis of the work, especially its complex relationship between music and movement. "Ballet: The Grandeur of Balanchine's 'Barocco,'" New York Times, January 8, 1979. E.g., "The structure of the score consistently finds its equivalent on stage, with the two ballerinas corresponding to the two solo violins, and yet this is no schematic visualization. . . . The idea of polyphonic density takes on an unusual richness." Ibid. Return to text

(17) Twentieth-century audiences are familiar with Balanchine's wedding of movement and music, but a variety of different viewpoints regarding the importance of music have enjoyed acceptance. Until this century, the most popular view was that music should serve primarily as unobtrusive background accompaniment, with otherwise little concern for the quality of music.

Critic Carl Van Vechten notes that in the nineteenth century, ". . . the simplest and most banal tunes, the baldest rhythm, the most threadbare harmony, sufficed. Nay more, music with any true verve or character was repudiated as actually likely to exercise a detrimental effect." "Leo Delibes," The Dance Writings of Carl Van Vechten, ed. by Paul Padgette (New York: Dance Horizons, 1974).

See also, Anatole Chujoy, The Dance Encyclopedia (New York: A. S. Barnes and Company, 1949), p. 35. Return to text

(18) Supra, Chapter II, note 207. Return to text

(19) Modern dance pioneer Mary Wigman rejected the assumption of the primacy of music and created several dances without any music at all, so as to destroy ". . . the domination both of musical formalism and of its emotional suggestions. . . ." John Martin, Introduction to the Dance (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1939), p. 234.

Wigman's views evolved considerably during her career, however. After experimenting with silent dances, she moved to what she called ". . . a new re-integration of music with the dance," the simultaneous creation of music and dance, with the dancers continually changing places with the musicians during the creative process. Mary Wigman, "Composition in Pure Movement," in Modern Culture and the Arts, ed. by James B. Hall and Barry Ulanov (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1967), p. 408. Return to text

(20) Philosophy of Art (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1963), p. 66. Return to text

(21) Ibid. Return to text

(22) Ibid. (emphasis added) Return to text

(23) "Chance and Design in Choreography," JAAC, XXI (Fall, 1962), 15. Return to text

(24) (Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press, 1980). Return to text

(25) Ibid., p. 42. Return to text

(26) "What Is Going On in a Dance?" (Unpublished paper, delivered at Temple University conference on dance, May 5, 1979). Return to text

(27) Ibid. Return to text

(28) Ibid. Return to text

(29) Susanne K. Langer, Problems of Art (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1957), pp. 4-5. Return to text

(30) Khatchadourian, "Movement and Action in the Performing Arts," 26. Return to text

(31) Aesthetics: Problems in the Philosophy of Criticism (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1958). (Hereinafter referred to as "Aesthetics."), p. 366. Return to text

(32) Oxford English Dictionary, 1971, I, 623. Return to text

(33) Ibid., 263. Return to text

(34) Langer, Problems of Art, p. 85 (emphasis added). Return to text

(35) Oxford English Dictionary, 1971, I, 510. Return to text

(36) Langer, Problems of Art, p. 85. Return to text

(37) "'The Afternoon of a Faun' and the Interrelation of the Arts," JAAC, X (December, 1951), 95. Return to text

(38) Ibid. Return to text

(39) Ibid., 109. Return to text

(40) Ibid., 110. Return to text

(41) Ibid., 100. Return to text

(42) Ibid., 111. Return to text

(43) Ibid. Return to text

(44) Ibid. Return to text

(45) Infra, note 86-88. Return to text

(46) "Chance and Design in Choreography," 16. Return to text

(47) Critic Arnold Haskell has said that ". . . the musical purist tends to think in terms of the concert-hall rather than of theatrical effectiveness. The ballet is essentially theatre, and good theatre can under certain circumstances excuse what is bad taste on paper." Ballet (Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1938), p. 118.

Norman Lloyd makes a similar point: "The most basic rule for dance music is: if it works, it's good. This has little or nothing to do with the quality of the music as music. A dance score cannot be judged on purely musical terms." Norman Lloyd, "Composing for the Dance," in The Dance Has Many Faces, ed. by Walter Sorell (New York: Columbia University Press, 1966), p. 144. Return to text

(48) "Nothing is more wrongheaded than to attempt to judge ballet's emotional expression by the standards of any other art." George Borodin, Invitation to Ballet (London: Werner Laurie, 1950), p. 141. Return to text

(49) Ibid., p. 113. Return to text

(50) Ibid., p. 200; see also, p. 112. Return to text

(51) Cyril W. Beaumont, Supplement to Complete Book of Ballets (London: C. W. Beaumont, 1942), p. 50. Return to text

(52) Many writers have made this rather obvious point. E.g., Borodin rejects ". . . the idea, sometimes held, that ballet is a mere assembling together of parts, like a model made with a constructional toy." Invitation to Ballet, p. 201. Return to text

(53) Borodin notes that ". . . those who create ballet . . . must work, as other artists do, within the limitations of their medium." Ibid., p. 113. This suggests that either collaborative efforts of several artists are more likely to be stifling and inferior or that dance itself is a serious artistic restriction. Return to text

(54) Beardsley, Aesthetics, p. 366. Return to text

(55) Ibid., p. 324. (Emphasis added) Return to text

(56) Etienne Gilson, Forms and Substances in the Arts, trans. By Salvator Attamasio (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1966), p. 205. Return to text

(57) Aldrich, Philosophy of Art, p. 67.

A good example of critical use of this principle is Anna Kisselgoff's criticism of the Royal Ballet's production of Mayerling, choreographed by Kenneth MacMillan: "Strong on theatricality, the ballet is weak . . . in the choreography . . . . A ballet more about ideas than ideas expressed through dancing." "Royal Ballet Offers Houston 'Mayerling,'" New York Times, June 8, 1978. Return to text

(58) One typical example among the numerous ones available is Jack Anderson's finding of appropriateness between the degree of sophistication of movements and music in Jerome Robbins' In G Major: "Jazziness returns in the jaunty final movement, which begins with jogging and ends with what resembles a series of poses for glamorous fashion models. The poses seem appropriate to the sophistication of the concerto. Like Ravel's music, "In G Major" is chic and glamorous, but never merely glib." "Miss Farrell and Martins in 'G Major,'" New York Times, June 18, 1978. Return to text

(59) "'The Afternoon of a Faun,'" 109. Return to text

(60) Ibid., 96. Return to text

(61) Ibid. Return to text

(62) Ibid., 110. Return to text

(63) Ibid. Return to text

(64) Jean-Georges Noverre, Letters on Dancing and Ballets, trans. By Cyril W. Beaumont (London: C. W. Beaumont, 1951),

p. 60. See also, author's preface, pp. 4-5. Return to text

(65) Beaumont says, for example, that "The music by Adam was considered to be superior to the usual run of ballet music, . . . particularly for the close relation of the music with the varied situations of the theme." Cyril W. Beaumont, Complete Book of Ballets (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1938), p. 134. Return to text

(66) See, e.g., Lincoln Kirstein's discussion in Blast at Ballet: A Corrective for the American Audience (New York: Marstin Press, Inc., 1938), pp. 22-4. Return to text

(67) The principles were originally printed in The London Times and have been reprinted widely. See, e.g., Richard Kraus, History of Dance (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1966), pp. 171-2. Return to text

(68) Norman Lloyd writes, for example: "One of the primary functions of dance music is that it is needed to hold a group of dancers together . . . . There is a point of rhythmic subtlety beyond which the composer cannot go. . . . Successful dance scores do have a clearly perceptible beat, despite the seeming complexities to the music." "Composing for the Dance," p. 149; see also, pp. 144-5. Return to text

(69) Selma Jeanne Cohen writes that the avant-garde today like their music ". . . sparse and undistracting." "Avant-Garde Choreography," in Sorell, Many Faces, pp. 215-6. Return to text

(70) See, e.g., Mike Steele, "Cunningham: Relentless experimenter with dance," Minneapolis Tribune, March 16, 1975.

St. Denis' colleague Ted Shawn also experimented with "music visualization," described by Jennifer Dunning after a recent revival of his The Dome as: "Neat, plain little geometric assemblages or 'music visualizations' that follow the music beat for beat and impulse for impulse, the dancer were designed in 1933 and 1940 to show that men could retain their masculinity in the ornamental art of dance." "Dance: Premiere at Pillow," New York Times, July 20, 1978. Return to text

(71) "Music Visualization," in Dance as a Theatre Art, ed. by Selma Jeanne Cohen (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1974), p. 130. Return to text

(72) Review of The Shakers, performed by the Jose Limon Dance Company. Clive Barnes, "Limon Dancers Honor Doris Humphrey," New York Times, April 2, 1975. Return to text

(73) Review of Opus Lemaitre, performed by the Pennsylvania Ballet. Samuel L. Singer, "Penna. Ballet Adds A Worthy Import," Philadelphia Inquirer, March 15, 1974. Return to text

(74) Selma Jeanne Cohen, "A Prolegomenon to an Aesthetics of Dance," in The Dance Experience, ed. by Myron H. Nadel and Constance Nadel Miller (New York: Universe Books, 1978), p. 11. Return to text

(75) Cohen, "Avant-Garde Choreography," p. 216. Return to text

(76) Mary Wigman, The Language of Dance, trans. By Walter Sorell (Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1966), p. 23. Return to text

(77) See, e.g., John Martin, Introduction to the Dance, p. 227. Return to text

(78) Lincoln Kirstein notes, e.g., that "Ballet is, of course, about all these [factors] in varying degrees of importance at different periods of history, or at different moments in the same evening, but it is about one thing constantly, supremely . . . , dancing in time." What Ballet is About: An American Glossary (New York: Johnson Reprint Corporation, 1958), p. 80 [reprinted from Dance Perspectives I (Winter, 1958)] .

As with all criticism, careful analysis is needed to understand the real intent of the writer regarding these relative values. Arlene Croce, e.g., recently made the comment regarding The Sleeping Beauty that "The conductor is more important to the success of this ballet than the ballerina." "Dancing: 'Beauty in distress,'" New Yorker, LII (July 5, 1976), p. 78. A careful reading of her review, however, clearly indicates that she is not claiming that the quality of the music overall is more important than the quality of the human movement in a dance performance. Rather, she is indicating that even though the quality of the human movement is most important to the performance, the quality of the music is so important here that, if it is not good, the movement will almost certainly not be good either. Return to text

(79) Deirdre Priddin, The Art of the Dance in French Literature (London: Adam and Charles Black, 1952), p. 8. Return to text

(80) See, e.g., Fokine's fourth principle, printed in the London Times in 1914: ". . . the entire group of dancers should be used to develop the theme of the ballet and should be part of the plot, rather than having the corps de ballet provide decorative interludes that had no significance."

Quoted in Kraus, History, p. 172. See also the discussion in Priddin, Art of the Dance, pp. 6-7. Return to text

(81) Critical examples abound on this point. See, e.g., Borodin, Invitation to Ballet, p. 69: "What makes a ballet is its form of expression to which technique is no more than an aid." See also, Angna enters, "The Dance and Pantomime: Mimesis and Image," in Sorell, Many Faces, p. 81: "Leaps, stretches, whirls or contortions - those automatic standbys of dance - may make momentarily exciting and decorative patterns but, like all decorative arts, their patterns, repeated, soon pall. And then another stunt must be devised. Art is not a stunt." Return to text

(82) See, e.g., Selma Jeanne Cohen's discussion of Alwin Nikolais, "Avant-Garde Choreography," p. 219. Return to text

(83) Anatole Chujoy notes that the term "DECOR, actually means scenery, props and costumes designed for and used in a theatrical production. In U.S. and English usage, however, decor has come to mean scenery and props, as distinguished from costumes." Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 142. For simplicity, we will follow the later usage. Return to text

(84) Excerpted from Fokine's fifth principle in the London Times, 1914. Quoted in Kraus, History, p. 172.

Fokine's principles are still alive today. In praising the National Ballet of Cuba, Anna Kisselgoff recently wrote: "Even more important has been Miss [Alicia] Alonso's adherence to Fokine's famous principles that every element of a production must be dramatically integral to the work itself. This commitment accounts for her fabulous staging of 'Giselle.'" "Cuban Ballet Favors Fokine," New York Times, June 25, 1978.

Cohen notes that costume and decor have played a very important ". . . role in ballet productions from the time of the Renaissance." "Review: Dance Index," JAAC, XXX (Summer, 1972), 558. Return to text

(85) In reviewing contemporary revivals of Diaghileff's productions, Arlene Croce bemoans "the value that was assigned to dancing in those days - fairly low compared with music, scenery, costumes, story, and mime. A dance virtuoso like Nijinsky was expected to work as much with the last three elements as with dance and bring everything to a focus in his performance." "Dancing: New from the Muses," New Yorker, September 11, 1978, p. 126.

Diaghileff's views are widely discussed in the literature. See, e.g., George Auberg, "Design for Theatrical Dance," in Chujoy, Encyclopedia, pp. 147-8; Kirstein, What Ballet Is About, pp. 74-6; Priddin, Art of the Dance, p. 106;

Van Vechten, Dance Writings, pp. 60-1. Return to text

(86) Picasso designed the stage settings and costumes for three ballets by choreographer Leonide Massine for Diaghileff's company: Parade (1917), The Three-Cornered Hat (1919), and Pulcinella (1920). Picasso also designed the curtain for Le Train Bleu, choreographed by Bronislava Nijinska in 1924 for Diaghileff. Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 374. Return to text

(87) Chagall designed the sets and costumes for Massine's Aleko (1942) and Adolph Bolm's Firebird (1945). Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 90. Return to text

(88) Dali designed the sets and costumes for Massine's Bacchanale (1939), Labyrinth (1941), and Mad Tristan (1944), and Andre Eglevsky's Sentimental Colloquy (1944). Chujoy, Encyclopedia, p. 125. Return to text

(89) See, e.g., Clive Barnes' criticism of Murray Louis' production of Scheherezade that ". . . the work is more concerned with visual and dramatic fantasy than dance expression." "Dance: Murray Louis's Ambitious 'Scheherezade,'" New York Times, December 30, 1974. Return to text

(90) Ballet, pp. 58-9. Return to text

(91) Haskell, Ballet, p. 58. Although Haskell considers scenery to be ". . . less indispensably connected . . . " with a ballet than the costuming, he does claim that, if the scenery were removed from the ballet Jeux d'Enfants, ". . . the 'truth' of this ballet would vanish." p. 58. Return to text

(92) See, e.g., Arlene Croce's detailed analysis of the importance of inadequate scenery in American Ballet Theatre's current production of The Sleeping Beauty, "Beauty in Distress," p. 78. Return to text

(93) Although many contemporary companies follow this practice, Balanchine is perhaps best known for such productions, often using only ". . . a skillfully let cyclorama . . . [and] just leotards or tunics for the women, black tights and white shirts for the men." Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 157. Anna Kisselgoff notes that Balanchine ". . . developed a new line of 'abstract,' almost mathematical works that have familiarly been known as his practice-clothes ballets because they are danced in leotards and tights." "Ballet: 'Episodes' Debuts," New York Times, January 10, 1975. Return to text

(94) Cohen, Theatre Art, p. 157; see also, Balanchine, "Marginal Notes on the Dance," in Sorell, Many Faces, p. 101. Return to text

(95) See, e.g., the discussion in Kirstein, What Ballet Is About, p. 65. Return to text

(96) "Perceiving Dance," Journal of Aesthetic Education, IX (October, 1975), 107. Return to text

Comments and questions are welcome: jvancamp@csulb.edu

Last updated: August 16, 1997

PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS OF DANCE CRITICISM

CHAPTER IV

THE IDENTITY OF WORKS OF ART IN DANCE

by Julie Charlotte Van Camp

Copyright Julie Charlotte Van Camp 1981

All Rights Reserved

NOTE: This dissertation may be downloaded, saved, printed, and reproduced for personal, educational, and scholarly uses, but only if this complete permissions notice and the full copyright notice are included with any such uses. This dissertation may not be sold or otherwise used for commercial purposes. For commercial use, please contact the author.

The page numbers from the original dissertation are included in the text here as follows: /p. x.

Endnotes from the original dissertation are included in the text here as follows: (x)

The dance world tolerates astonishing variation in the performance of dance works without loss of identity. Virtually every aspect of dance has been subject to considerable alteration; performances without major changes from previous ones of the same work are rare, although, significantly, increasingly less rare. Choreography is routinely altered, sometimes completely, (1) from other productions with the same name. (2) Traditional mime passages are shortened or eliminated, (3) plots altered, dramatic themes revised, (4) music inserted, (5) deleted, or re-arranged. (6) Audiences, critics, and artists alike usually find such practices quite acceptable, (7) in sharp contrast with the unthinkability of major (intentional) changes in, say, the score for Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. (8)

This chapter briefly surveys examples of the variation tolerated without loss of identity, and the differences among dance genre in the importance of different media (movement, music, etc.) in establishing identity and in the degree of variation tolerated. The inadequacy of identity theories relying primarily or exclusively on notational systems to explain identity in dance is discussed in terms of these practices. An alternative is proposed using the

test of infringement of copyright artworks, "substantial similarity," as determined by lay observers.

A. Actual Practices in Establishing Identity of Dance Works

the nineteenth-century full-evening "story-ballets," still predominant in the repertories of many companies, illustrate the great variation in performance tolerated by the dance world without loss of identity. Typical of these is Giselle. First produced in Paris in 1841, with an almost unbroken history of production, it is still in the repertory of many major ballet companies. (9) Numerous, substantial changes in choreography are well-documented, (10) and contemporary audiences demand identity only of certain well-known solos, pas de deux, and ensembles. (11) changes in the plot, manifested in different movement patterns, occurred in the nineteenth century, (12) but are not limited primarily to changes in the attitude and motivation of the major characters. (13) movements portraying dramatic details are still routinely altered, even in performances by the same company, (14) as is the traditional mime. (15) While strict identity of the choreography of much of the rhythmic movement is essential to the ballet, the non-dancing dramatic movement is not subject to such strict standards, but is considered an opportunity for dancers to interpret the roles by adding or substituting their own movement designs (normally, planned in advance of performance). As these dramatic movements (walking, etc.) can be as easily notated as pure, rhythmic dance movements,

the difference in essentiality does not reflect amenability to notation, but may reflect a view of dance as primarily movement, and only secondarily as a form of theater.

Alterations in the music of Giselle, as with other ballet classics, are considerable, despite the availability of musical notation. Major sections of the original score are routinely omitted or changed by repetition. (16) Music by another composer is usually added. (17) Music plays an important role, but one decidedly subservient to the choreography and the dramatic needs of a particular version, (18) helping to explain the liberal tolerance for variation.

As in other performing arts, considerable variation is acceptable in costumes, scenery, and lighting, as long as they are consistent with the dramatic theme of the ballet (e.g., peasant dresses in Act I and long white tutus for the Wilis in Act II). (19) Scenery (20) and props (21) are also varied, especially in authenticity and details, but remain consistent with the dramatic theme.

In sharp contrast are works choreographed by George Balanchine of the new York City Ballet, especially his neoclassical works which embody music in choreography. (22) The music is performed to meticulously follow the original composition by the composer, even in tempo. (23) The original choreography by Balanchine is adhered to precisely, (24) both specific movements and interpretive aspects designed by Balanchine. (25) Only Balanchine himself alters the choreography, something he often does to tailor roles to specific

dancers. (26) As most of his neo-classical ballets are plotless, this is not a factor, (27) but radical changes in costuming are common. (28) Balanchine ballets are the extreme case, but other contemporary or recent choreographic masterpieces receive similar deference. (29)

Notational systems are now widely available for dance, (30) and have been for some time, (31) but that availability does not explain the differences or even correlate with identity standards for various types of ballets or in different centuries. Although contemporary choreographers increasingly have their works recorded in written notation (32) or on film for archival and copyright purposes, many, including Balanchine, until very recently, have resisted that practice, partly because of the tremendous expense (33) and the continuing acceptability of handing ballets down from dancer to dancer. (34) Identity practices correlate more closely with conventions for appreciating and evaluating dance, than with the availability of notation. Identity standards for Balanchine ballets reflect the view that contemporary dance is primarily movement which expresses or embodies music. In the nineteenth century, the performances of particular dancers were more important than the choreography itself, and changes in the choreography were tolerated almost without limitation. In the twentieth century, with increasing emphasis on choreography more than individual performances, changes tolerated in the choreography, even in the story-ballets, are more limited. (35)

Notation reconstructor Rochelle Zide-Booth, after extolling the advantages of notation, raises what she treats as a wholly legitimate question, ". . . what . . . could or should be altered by the reconstructor?" (36) she treats sanguinely alterations in steps if beyond the capacity of the dancers. The aspect which must be preserved is the "quality" of the work, she says, (37) which is not a matter of strict adherence to notation. She also distinguishes works ". . . which must be reconstructed as closely as possible to their original productions in order to be valid, and . . . those which need some changes in order to make them acceptable to today's audiences," (38), including full-length classics from previous centuries.

Significantly, although a notational system for music has been available for centuries, identity requirements for the music in dance vary considerably. The strict identity of the concert hall is demanded for some, while identity with only general melodic themes is acceptable for others. Plots can be written down in words, to preserve with some precision the events to be portrayed, yet faithfulness to original plots has been limited. Since identity cannot be explained solely in terms of notational systems, other approaches are needed which account for and clarify the ways in which identity is actually established in dance.

B. Philosophical Theories of Identity in Dance

Philosophers have tried to account for identity in dance in a variety of ways, using appeals to notational systems,

production histories, cultural context, or some combination of those factors. Inadequacies of these theories can be summarized as either inadequate and inaccurate attention to the artform itself or as confusion about the purposes of identity theory.

Stephen Pepper, over 25 years ago, seemed to be unaware of the existence of written notation for dance when he wrote that ". . . there is no physical continuant of any importance like the written play in the drama or the score in music." (39) He seems instead to emphasize the importance of cultural agreements in identity, as when he says:

. . . lacking an ordinary physical continuant, that is replaced by a cultural continuant, the patterns of which are transmitted to perception through the medium of the dancers. The cultural continuant thus acts as a remote control upon the perceptual structure, just like a written play or a musical score except that its locus of existence is not on physical paper but in man's memories. (40)

Pepper could be claiming here that a notational scheme like musical notation could be constructed from the memories of dancers of particular works. But he could also be claiming that the memory of a dance is like the memory of a painting and is transmitted as completely as the frailty of human memory permits. Because he does not discuss or explain the role of notation as it does exist, it would be unfair and unfruitful to pursue detailed dissection of his observations.

Etienne Gilson recognized the potential of notation as

an encouragement to and reflection of increasing standardization of movement. Although noting that "the positions of the body and the movement of transition do not have the precision of a tone scale nor the exactness of musical duration," (41) he believes it possible that dance will develop " . . . definite works, stabilized through the resources of an appropriate score and as easily transmittable as are musical compositions today." (42) Gilson does not, however, explain how this evolution will occur nor does he pursue issues of compliance with such scores.

Joseph Margolis and Nelson Goodman, in more recent and detailed analyses, have explained philosophical identity in dance in terms of the increasing availability of notational systems, although they disagree sharply on whether such systems can wholly specify the identity of a work.

Margolis says that each performance is a token of a megatype fixed in a notational system, either an existing notation of a megatype or one constructed or constructable from observing performances. (43) "If we wish to assert that two performances are instances of the same megatype, we must be prepared to formulate a dance notation for which either performance will be a plausible token." (44) As we could construct a megatype for two performances which claimed to be The Dying Swan, yet failed in the same way to be so, formulation of the notation in itself does not show "authenticity." More importantly, Margolis does not say how much or what sort of compliance with notation is

required for a performance to be a "plausible" token of a megatype, nor who is best equipped to make such determinations, nor whether the degree of similarity must be the same for all types of dances, important questions taken up below.

He notes that prime notations which record generally accepted requirements for the identity of a work sometimes exist for dance (as they do for music), but prime notations might not always exist, for example, for folk dances. (45) Presumably, however, from among several competing megatypes which have been notated, one could become recognized as the "prime notation." Margolis does not say whether the version approved by the choreographer has a better claim to being considered the prime notation, but this is generally the case, as with ballets by Balanchine. He also does not say whether another fixation (such as a film or verbal description), either along or in conjunction with a symbolic notation, could establish generally-accepted requirements for identity, but it does in practice. He claims that dance (again like music) never has prime instances, which are critical instances (as of poems) which set standards for the other instances. A prime instance is ". . . a device for controlling the enumeration of tokens for a given megatype." (46) Margolis seems to deny that they exist for dance because of the difficulty distinguishing the megatype and the contributions of the individual dancer in a particular performance. (47) However, as he himself acknowledges in a

recent book, (48) devices which serve the function of prime instances do exist for dance, including definitive performances of a particular role (e.g., Anna Pavlova's performances of the Dying Swan, recorded on film; Vaslav Nijinsky's performances of Fokine ballets, recorded in the memories of living people, in extensive verbal descriptions, and expressive still photographs; (49) and Gelsey Kirkland's performance of Clara in The Nutcracker seen by millions in a recorded television program) or the world premiere performance of a new work by a dancer on whom it was choreographed. Such performances existed in time and, except for those on film, could never be seen again. Yet in practice they serve as important "devices for controlling the enumeration of tokens for a given megatype," if they are retained in the memory of dancers and audiences or if the performance was recorded on film, in photographs, or verbal descriptions. (50) it is difficult to see any difference between "prime instance" (defined in terms of its function) and something which serves that function.

Notation plays an important role in Margolis' views. First, he has said that, as notations are increasingly available, concert dances will be identified according to them. (51) to use his concepts, for a particular performance, a megatype can be formulated in notation; this notation could then be accepted as the prime notation. The importance of notation here is thus its potential as a standard, less fallible than human memory, against which particular

performances (tokens) can be compared for identity. But only a handful of people can actually read existing notational systems, and, because of their extreme complexity, this is not likely to change. Notational systems simply do not play any significant role in establishing identity in actual practice, as audiences and dancers alike continue to rely primarily on human memory to make identifications, with assistance from films and videotapes (which are not notations, but works of art themselves (52)), and verbal descriptions. Films of different dancers in the same work permit distinctions to be made between the choreographic design and the interpretations of individual dancers. The development and increasing availability of notational systems, understood as standards of identity, do not satisfactorily account for historical shifts in identity standards nor for present practices.

Notational systems are also important for Margolis because their existence reflects a standardization of the materials of an artform. (53) Sameness or identity can be established only when recognizable elements in different performances can be compared to determine identity with the megatype; the emergence of a notational system reflects that standardization of elements. However, the classical ballet vocabulary of standardized movements, with specific verbal descriptions (e.g., demi-plié in first position) existed long before contemporary notational systems were developed. To indicate time measures, dance has always had available

the notational system of music.

Ballet is noted for its constant innovations in the movement vocabulary, new steps, as well as new combinations of steps, but this does not mean it lacks the requisite standardization. The verbal characterizations long available can easily accommodate these new, nonstandard materials, as can notational systems which use locations of parts of the body. Notation was a very late arrival reflecting increasing standardization. It has not been absolutely essential to that process, nor the only evidence of it, and it has not added to or detracted from the continuing evolution of nonstandard movements.

A recent article by Margolis (54) stresses, not the importance of notational systems, but their inadequacy in accounting for identity. He acknowledges only that

Dance scores are primarily heuristic devices for recovering a minimal sense of the principal positions and movement of a given dance. (55)

He denies that such notation allows consideration of dance as an allographic art, as proposed by Goodman. (56) Along with the known divergence of dance performances, the reasons Margolis denies that dance could be allographic include, first, the discrepancy between ". . . the emphasis on visual recognition tout court in the notation and the requirements of actually generating dance movements in terms of the dynamics of motor activity controlled proprioceptively." (57) However, this reason seems to conflate the establishment of

identity of a work with the quite separate activity of learning how to produce the movements of a certain work or produce them in a particular way. Musical notation tells me nothing about how to blow or strike a musical instrument, but that does not render the notation "a mere heuristic device." A related conflation occurs later when he says:

There simply is not reliable correspondence between a dancer's performing a set of movements in accord with a mere notation and an audience's seizing the expressive qualities somehow conveyed by those movements. (58)

However, the former, performance, in accord with a notation, could be all that is needed for identity of the work, while the latter could be a separate matter of good performance of the work.

It is difficult to reconcile the various positions Margolis has put forth. Earlier, to assert that two performances are instances of the same megatype, we had to be able to construct a notation for which both are plausible tokens. Now it seems that construction of this notation is insufficient to establish sameness of the performances. The dancer must also know how to produce the movements. But why cannot the test of whether the dancer has succeeded in producing the movement be measured against that notation? Similarly, "expressiveness' depends on movements produced which could be notated. The same movements can be expressive of rather different things, depending on the interpretation of the dancer, but those variations need not and do not change

the identity of the work. In the black swan pas de deux of Act III of Swan Lake, some dancers express the same hardness of the evil magician while others, through their interpretation (the nuances of face, arms, phrasing, and manner of attack) express an underlying vulnerability akin to the white swan of the other acts. Yet audiences to not treat these as different works (assuming the same choreography) although they do treat them as different interpretations.

Margolis also denies the allographic character of dance because of the central role of uniquely expressive human bodies as instruments, (59) which ". . . cannot be satisfactorily represented by an extensional notation." (60) But this again confuses identity of a work with the evaluation of an individual dancer's interpretation of a work. An outraged choreographer, say, a Martha Graham, distressed by performance of one of her works by a dancer not trained or coached in her methods, might vehemently insist that it was not a performance of the Graham work at all. But Graham's likely behavior would betray this assertion of outrage. She might contemplate, for example, a lawsuit for infringement of the copyright or common law misappropriation of her work. A highly unorthodox performance of Swan Lake, resulting from an unusual and perhaps poorly suited body, results in several different assessments, which should be kept distinct: (1) the identity of the work is Swan Lake, but (2) the performance by a particular dancer is poor or inappropriate, perhaps because the body was not appropriate.

The increasing ease with which such distinctions can be made reflects the shift in understanding of the artform from one primarily concerned with the performances of individuals to one recognizing a collection of works performed in various ways by individuals. The outraged exclamation of choreographers (or critics) that a certain performance is not a performance of the work at all, must be carefully scrutinized. The overstatement could simply be an emphatic way of denying that the work had been well or acceptably performed, as opposed to a denial that it was the work at all.

Margolis may be correct in insisting that "the dance cannot be appreciated without some sense of how movements are actually generated," (61) but it does not necessarily follow that this knowledge is necessary to establish identity of a work. Margolis now believes this knowledge is necessary, when he rejects ". . . the notational constraint on the reidentification of a dance from performance to performance." (62) But Margolis has not shown that identity of a work necessarily depends on performance aspects which cannot be notated. Current practice suggests otherwise - we can and do distinguish between performances not of the same work and performances which are poor performances of the same work. Nor has he explained the minimal "heuristic" role which he says notation does play. If he simply means that most dancers still learn roles by watching other dancers instead of reading scores, I would agree. But some piano players still play "by ear" without reading music - that

does not show that notation has no role in establishing identity of dance.

Margolis' recent analysis is useful in highlighting the complex texture of the phenomenon of dance, but within this broad context the precise questions must be kept clear: identity of works, production of works, interpretation by dancers, evaluation of performances, and training of dancers to be able to perform works.

For Nelson Goodman, a notational system is also the sole measure of identity for dance works: "The function of a score is to specify the essential properties a performance must have to belong to the work . . . . All other variations are permitted; and the differences among performances of the same work, even in music, are enormous." (63) A notational system permits identification of ". . . a dance in its several performances, independently of any particular history of production." (64) Notation of any artform is developed ". . . in order to transcend the limitations of time and the individual." (65)

Like Margolis, Goodman argues that notational systems are possible only when there has been a necessary systematization of the materials of the artform, ". . . an antecedent classification of performances into works that is similarly independent of history of production," (66) which depends on there being distinctions ". . . between the constitutive and the contingent properties of a work." (67) He says that, although it is ". . . rough and tentative," (68) such a classi-

fication exists for a dance, a conclusion apparently reached because "prior to any notation, we make reasonably consistent judgments as to whether performances by different people are instances of the same dance." (69) Notational systems follow, but do not dictate, ". . . lines antecedently drawn by the informal classification of performances into works and by practical decisions as to what is prescribed and what is optional." (70) Goodman seems to consider the prerequisite classification as both standardization of particular movements and agreement about the identity of works considered in toto, while Margolis addresses only the former.

Goodman does not show that a notational system is or must be the sole device for establishing identity in dance. As he notes in discussing the prerequisites to a notational system, consistent judgment regarding identity of dance performances are already made independently of a notational system, although he does not indicate how such identifications are made. Further, it is simply not the case that the availability of notational systems has affected identity standards in dance so that no variations are permitted from the score and all other variations are permitted.

Certainly notation of dance is possible, and useful for theoretical analysis of an artform, but its availability does little to explain how audiences actually make comparisons for the purpose of establishing identity either before the emergence of notation nor once notation exists. A philosophical identity theory should explain what happens in

the artform. This should not be merely a descriptive account devoid of theory, but nor should it be a theory devoid of clarification of what actually happens.

Useful accounts of how the identity of dances is established in practice by audiences, choreographers, and dancers, have been developed recently by Adina Armelagos and Mary Sirridge. (71) However, in criticizing Goodman's proposals by showing the inadequacy of notational systems to provide the necessary and sufficient determinants for the identity of dance performances, they have failed to make certain important distinctions. First, they insist that performances must be characterized in terms of history of production to establish identity, but these characterizations are nothing but convenient descriptions which could be restated in terms of perceivable differences in performances and which could be notated or fixed in a tangible medium. Second, they do not recognize or examine the recent development of new ways of establishing identity to supplement long-established habits. These methods are being developed because of important new opportunities for copyright of choreographic works, (72) and because of the burgeoning growth of dance, the shortage of choreographers, and the resulting potential for infringement of copyrighted works.

Armelagos and Sirridge argue first that Goodman's theory is ". . . too weak, as it fails to include alleged 'incidentals' and rests on a thoroughly inadequate notion of dance movement." (73) they describe two types of these alleged

"incidentals." First, music, costuming, and lighting, factors excluded in Goodman's exclusive focus on human movement, can be critical in determining the identity of a work. This observation seems correct, although these "incidental" factors do not show the inadequacy of all notation, but only that multiple notation or other methods for the different media of dance may be needed. Further, these "incidentals" do not show that Goodman's approach is inadequate for identity of the movement and music. Second, they argue that the history of production is often essential in determining identity, as the use of dancers trained in a certain movement style (e.g., the Jose Limon school of modern dance) may be essential for the work to meet identity requirements. (74) However, although the training history of the dancers is admittedly a convenient shorthand for characterizing performances, it is not essential, for different training results in perceivable differences in performance which can be described in other ways. It is easier to describe those differences by reference to training than through notation, but this description has not been shown to be essential. In addition, like Margolis, they do not precisely reflect actual practices. An outraged choreographer may deny that a certain performance is "his work" - but by suing for infringement of copyrighted work he would betray the fact that he does believe it is his work, albeit poorly performed.

Armelagos and Sirridge argue next that Goodman's theory

is also "too strong," (75) as 'choreography, as it is in fact done and as it determines the identity of a work, will not produce the kind of compliants that Goodman (and the notator) want," (76) making the score inadequate not just for retrieval or production, but also for identity. The reasons for this inadequacy are not entirely clear. They suggest, but do not explicitly claim, that the inadequacy results because (1) "style, stage elements, and performers are sometimes allowed to vary widely from performance to performance," (77) and (2) because ". . . elements involved in producing a performance and the activity of the performance itself are invariably relevant to determining what work we are seeing." (78)

With regard to the first claim, variations in style are not necessarily problematic for a notational theory, as those aspects of performance could be simply nonessential. Stage elements (presumably, costuming, lighting, and so forth) do not show that notation of movement and music is inadequate for those aspects of a performance, but only that it is incomplete. The practice of substituting different performers at various performances suggests that dance identity can be free of the history of production, rather than necessarily tied to it. The problem with Goodman's approach is somewhat different. As few if any actual performances meet his standard of absolute compliance with a score, his theory is useless for understanding identity of actual works and performances without analysis of how much noncompliance

with movement and musical notation can be tolerated in practice without loss of identity.

Some criticism of the second reason why Goodman is "too strong" has been noted above and can now be further clarified. Armelagos and Sirridge say that a fundamental problem is ". . . that the common sense basic unit of movement construction, the step, is ill-defined," (79) and ". . . thus not interpretable independent of its history of production." (80) They acknowledge that notations can record ". . . a sequence of finely differentiated body positions," (81) but insist that this would still lack essential information about style and kinesthetic motivation. The "ill-definition" of a step does not seem to be unclearness as to position at a "slice of time," as for a note, but rather lack of clarity as to how much detail is needed about precise body locations at every moment. Again, however, it has not been shown that the perceivable differences resulting from "style, vocabulary, and kinesthetic motivation" could not be notated or that these causal factors are anything more than convenient ways of describing what can be seen and might be notated. The claim that scores are not adequate for producing a work ". . . if the style, its vocabulary, and its characteristic kinesthetic motivator and ideals are not antecedently known" (82) is irrelevant, as the adequacy of a score depends, not on how useful it is for producing a work, but rather on its usefulness for identification.

Armelagos and Sirridge note that in practice artists

are suspicious of notation, (83) but this could simply be the result of the availability of more familiar and convenient ways of transmitting dance works. However, circumstances in very recent years are making the use of notation (or fixation in a tangible medium such as film) much more attractive and necessary. With the well-known explosion in dance companies and activity, many companies are finding themselves unable to perform certain works, because a rehearsal master who knows the ballet is unavailable to teach it to the company. (84) The copyrightability of choreographic works, as of January 1, 1978, is encouraging choreographers to fix their works in a tangible medium, as the possibilities for infringement have increased substantially with the performance of works on television, the availability of home video-recorders, and the shortage of choreographers to create new works. How scores have traditionally been used proves less and less in view of the current shifts in attitude, necessity, and legal protection.

Armelagos and Sirridge (and the late article by Margolis) have not shown that all conceivable notational systems are inherently inadequate for establishing identity in dance, but nor has Goodman nor Margolis shown that or how notation can account for identity in practice. Goodman has not reconciled his demand for strict compliance with what is realistically possible in actually complying with this standard. Margolis has not shown what it means for notation to play a "heuristic" role without establishing identity. I

have tried to show that interpretations of individual dancers, while perhaps relevant to evaluation of the performance, can be and are kept separate from the establishment of identity, as can the method of production, even though this knowledge is necessary to produce the performance.

The issues remaining are, first, what notation or fixation is necessary to establish identity, in view of the unusual characteristics and recently changed circumstances of dance, and second, how much and what sort of compliance with those notations, fixations, or other standards is needed to constitute identity of a work in practice.

C. The Lay Observer Test of Substantial Similarity in Copyright Infringement

In attempting to understand how identity is established in practice, it is useful to consider the practices in the area of copyright infringement, an increasingly important application of identity theory. Determinations of copyright infringement use both notation to fix an absolute standard of identity and a lay observer test of substantial similarity to measure degrees of compliance with that notation. The proposal here is that an identity theory must include two things: a standard for identity, through notation, and a test for application of that standard, namely substantial similarity. Goodman sets up the standard but does not explain how it can be applied. Armelagos, Sirridge, and the later Margolis article reject the standard now winning growing acceptance, and instead apply a test of

history of production which confuses identity of works with quality of performances.

The central requirement for showing infringement of copyrighted artworks is "substantial similarity," as determined finally by lay observers. The analysis of similarity by experts, using notational analysis or any other methodology, is relevant and admissible, but not conclusive on the jury of lay observers. The lay observer test in the law (which also has limited experience with the artform of dance) is an important application of identity principles, especially since the availability of copyright protection promises to have far-reaching impact on identity in dance generally. Legal determinations of identity directly involve the issues of philosophical identity, and illustrate the viability of a two-pronged test of identity using both notation (or fixation) to set an ideal for absolute identity and a lay observer test to apply that ideal and specify actual identity of specific performances. How much and what sort of compliance with that fixation and how this compliance is determined is an important question in infringement theory, but one not addressed clearly in the context of philosophical identity.

Choreographic works were explicitly included in the subject matter of copyright (85) for the first time in the Copyright Act of 1976, (86) but many were eligible for protection under the previous law, primarily in the category of dramatic and dramatico-musical works; (87) common law protec-

tion was also available. (88) To prove infringement under the new statute, several matters preliminary to substantial similarity must be shown: (1) the copyrighted work must fall within the general subject matter of "choreographic work," (2) the work must be original, (3) the allegedly infringed aspects of the work must be expressions, not ideas, (89) and (4) the work must be fixed in a tangible medium. All of these elements are problematic in the law, because of the expanded subject matter of the new statute and also the scarcity of prior decisions involving choreographic works. This scarcity can be attributed, at least in part, to the failure of many choreographers to register their works under previous statutes, (90) and the practical difficulty of actually reproducing a work created by someone else. (91) Decisions under prior statutes mainly addressed the issue of whether a work could be protected under the category of dramatico-musical work, an emphasis reflecting both the limited subject matter of prior statutes and the nineteenth-century conception of dance as primarily a form of the theater.

The philosophical problem of definition arises in copyright consideration. "Choreographic work" is not defined in the new statute, although the legislative history says that the term is one of several with "fairly settled meaning," and that it is not "necessary to specify that 'choreographic works' do not include social dance steps and simple routines." (92) The precise meaning of "choreographic

works" is not clear, however, from prior statutes or case law. Nor is there any indication that Congress intended to limit "choreographic works" to those which were protected previously under the category of dramatico-musical work. (93) Congress clearly did intend to provide categories eligible for protection with "sufficient flexibility to free the courts from rigid or outmoded concepts of the scope of particular categories." (94)

In the absence of further guidance from the statute or case law, the meaning of "choreographic work" must be developed from common usage as the design of ballet or dance, which raises problems similar to those addressed in Chapter II. However, as separate copyright protection is available for musical and (non-movement) visual dimensions of dance (e.g., scenery and costumes), "choreographic work" for the purpose of the new statute is probably limited to the dimension of human movement. Thus, because of administrative considerations, "choreographic work" is defined more narrowly than is necessarily the case in ordinary usage by critics, audiences, and dancers. The comparison between copyright and philosophical identity is thus limited, but limited to a central problem of identity, that of movement.

To be eligible for copyright, a choreographic work must be original, (95) not in the sense of historic novelty, but rather that "the production is the result of independent labor. . . ." (96) this prerequisite of originality differs from the philosophical claim that identity of a work depends

on knowing the history of production. The showing of originality for copyright eligibility involves only one aspect of the history of production, viz., whether the protected work originated with the creator. A showing of infringement must include proof that the history of production of the allegedly infringing work includes access by the infringer to the protected work or, if such a showing is not possible, similarity so striking as to make creation without such access highly improbable. This inquiry into history of production is ordinarily severable from the analysis of similarity. Regardless of the results of the historical inquiry, two works could be found legally to have substantial similarity; the historical inquiry bears, instead, on the recovery for infringement, if such similarity were found. That is, infringement involves both similarity and access. The latter may be shown by striking similarity, but if lack of access can be proved, then there is no infringement, regardless of the degree of similarity.

In contrast, when Armelagos and Sirridge claim that the history of production must be known to establish identity, they mean that information about the way a production came about (e.g., through a particular training of the dancers) must be known to establish the actual similarity. They are not making a claim that history of production can be shown by striking similarity, nor that history of production and similarity are two separate factors which must be proven, but rather that similarity can and must be shown by history

of production.

Infringement of all types of artworks is determined according to the "ordinary observer" test, (97) which is simply whether an ordinary observer, perceiving two works, considers them to be "substantially similar." If so, and if the other requirements for copyright are met, one is an infringement of the other, protected work. This test, quite obviously, could accommodate the variations for identity standards in different types of genre, such as Giselle and works by Balanchine.

The law is not entirely clear as to who is an "ordinary observer." The classic definition of copy, "that which comes so near to the original as to give every person seeing it the idea created by the original," (98) is ambiguous, as it could refer either to (1) any person on the face of the earth, brought into court to view the work, or (2) every person who might, of his own volition, attend a performance or exhibition of the work. Some courts limit the ordinary observers on the jury to persons with some familiarity with the subject matter, (99) a very justifiable restriction for choreographic works. Although the burgeoning popularity of dance in this country is well-known, audiences still represent a small minority of the general public. Given the complete unfamiliarity of so many with this artform, only those who know how to look (e.g., those with experience as audience members of dance performances) should decide infringement. For persons with no familiarity with

the artform, comparing two dances could be like comparing poems in unknown foreign languages.

Courts have excluded from juries in infringement actions persons unable to perceive differences in the works in question. For example, the tone-deaf have been excluded from juries in music infringement. (100) Similarly, a case involving infringement of a French novel by three English dramas was withdrawn from the jury as it was not considered capable of making satisfactory comparisons of the works. (101) These exclusionary principle have not yet been applied in choreographic infringement, but clearly could be.

Significantly, expert testimony is not determinative of "substantial similarity," but it is relevant for "dissection and analysis" of the infringing passages to determine originality, (102) which is not left to the "lay observer" test. Expert testimony is also relevant for determination that a work is a "choreographic work," and thus subject to protection. (103) the emphasis of the lay observer test is clear: regardless of expert analysis, the ultimate test is always what lay observers think is substantially similar. The actual practice of typical audience members prevails over theory.

Infringement of a copyrighted choreographic work would almost always be a violation of the exclusive right "to perform the copyrighted work publicly" (104) or, with films of the work, the right "to display the copyrighted work publicly." (105) Substantial similarity is determined by comparing

the allegedly infringing performance (or film) with the protected work. The degree of similarity required varies according to proof of access by the infringer to the protected work, (106) a factor not relevant to philosophical identity, as noted.

The provision for degrees of similarity recognizes actual practice. There is no insistence that similarity be absolutely present or absent. Instead of saying that two works must be found either identical or not, juries may examine degrees of similarity. When proof of access is missing, the similarity must be found to be so striking that the possibility of independent creation of the infringing work is unlikely. (The ultimate issue in copyright law is copying, not similarity. Even though two works were identical, infringement would not be found if the creator of the allegedly infringing work could decisively prove lack of access, in which case the striking similarity would be overridden.) Infringement could be found for a lesser (but still substantial) degree of similarity, if access were decisively proven.

Although the jury (or a judge in a trial without jury, although he still might use an advisory jury) is the decision-maker on the factual question of whether substantial similarity exists in a particular case, the judge still has an important role in providing guidelines to the jury regarding the meaning of "substantial similarity." (The judge might also withdraw the decision from the jury if the

similarity is so trifling that no reasonable jury could find "substantial similarity.")

The extremes of similarity for choreographic works seem easy. Substantial similarity would be found in performances consisting of the identical movements by the same ensemble of dancers as provided in the fixation of the protected work, or the identical movements by the same ensemble of one or more discrete sections, movements, or "variations," as fixed in the notation or other medium.

At the other extreme, two performances would not be "substantially similar" if they shared only some of the same standardized steps, and not in any noticeably similar sequence (e.g., performances whose only similarity was the use of frequent fouettés and pirouettes, but not in the same sequence or combination). This would be analogous to two musical works using some of the same chords, but not in any noticeably similar sequence.

The vast middle ground between these extremes is problematic. Case law involving theatrical spectacles or pantomime provides little guidance, primarily the test of similarity in plot and characters. (107) Substantial similarity in literary works also rests primarily on detailed plot situations and characters. (108) As a choreographic work need not contain any dramatic situation, similarity for purposes of copyright infringement cannot depend primarily on these elements. (109) Even when choreographic works do include a plot or dramatic element, it is not normally the central or

distinctive characteristic of the work. Analogies with substantial similarity in musical works are more appropriate, (110) because of the non-verbal, temporal nature of the artforms, but no less complicated. Although it is widely believed that a certain number of bars of an identical melody is a decisive test of infringement, (111) similarity in music is not that simple and mechanical. It is at least clear that for all types of works, including dance, value is an irrelevant consideration. (112)

Similarity can be usefully assessed in terms of the elements of typical dance performances (identified in Chapter II):

(1) basic "steps," from either established or newly created movement vocabularies, which are

(2) combined in sequences of several steps

(3) for one or more dancers,

(4) in a performing area,

(5) to the accompaniment of music,

(6) for the purpose of telling a story and/or communicating or expressing human emotions or feelings,

(7) with the aid of mime, costumes, scenery, and lighting.

(1) The mere sharing of particular steps from established movement vocabularies (e.g., double pirouettes, grand jetés, etc.), would not make two works substantially similar. A newly created step, in isolation from any particular sequence, might be a distinctive motif, but would also not

make two works similar. (113) (Analogously, in music, use of some standard chords or one distinctive harmony would not make two works substantially similar.)

(2) a sequence of steps could show substantial similarity, but the obvious problems are (a) how long (in time and number of steps) the combination must be, and (b) how much similarity is required (absolute identity of the entire body throughout, absolute identity of arms and legs only, some identity of some steps, etc.) the shorter the sequence and the less absolute identity of particular parts of the body, the less likely would be substantial similarity. No simple rules could be developed somehow quantifying these questions for every type of dance.

(3) Choreography for more than one person could provide grounds for a finding of substantial similarity. (114) An ensemble might perform the same combination of steps (perhaps not unusual in themselves, or in combination), but at different times, to create a striking visual pattern of movement. Analysis of a movement design should not focus only on each dancer in isolation, any more than a symphonic musical work should be considered only one instrument at a time.

(4) The choice of performing space might be a distinctive and integral part of a work and grounds for substantial similarity. The choice of location for movement is certainly a deliberate part of the design, especially when it is as unique as ramps running across the audience or the steps

leading to a public monument. For copyright infringement, however, the choice of performing space alone would probably be excluded from protection as a "procedure," although the pattern of movement designed for that space could be protected.

(5) The music used to accompany dance movements is subject to copyright under a different category, (115) but the choice of a particular musical accompaniment for certain movements might be a distinctive contribution, providing grounds for substantial similarity, as well as originality. Performing the Black Swan pas de deux from Swan Lake to a Sousa march instead of the traditional Tchaikovsky score might not only be distinctive and original, but historically novel. It is not clear whether this choice would be generally recognized within the meaning of "choreographic work" for purposes of copyright, however.

(6) Because of the absence of words, the dramatic element of dance (plot or story; emotions or feelings) is necessarily so generalized as to provide questionable grounds for substantial similarity (as well as failing the requirement of originality). Plots in themselves, apart from the movement, also might not be considered part of a "choreographic work" (116) for copyright purposes. Words with a distinctly original plot (e.g., avant-garde works using spoken dialogue or new "story-ballets") might still be eligible for registration as dramatico-musical works, (117) to ensure that protection is obtained for the dramatic element.

as well as the design of the movement.

(7) costumes, scenery, and lighting would probably be eligible for protection as "pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works." (118) As with the choice of music, the choice of costumes for use with certain movements might be historically novel and strong grounds for substantial similarity (e.g., performing the Dying Swan in a scarlet unitard), but would not clearly be part of a choreographic work in the sense of movement design. (119)

Several aspects of typical dance performances are subject to copyright under different categories of protection (music, scenery, costumes), but regardless of whether those aspects of a particular work have actually been copyrighted, they do not affect the substantial similarity of the movements themselves. (120) It could be argued that in infringement cases, especially if an ordinary lay jury were to make the final determination, performances for comparison purposes of the works in question should be presented with identical costumes, sets, and music. Even if all such elements are not protected by copyright, they affect the overall perceptual impact of the aspects of the work which are protected. (121)

With human movement only now clearly central under the copyright law in the new category of "choreographic works," a basic understanding of substantial similarity between movement designs has yet to be developed. A few basic principles for copyright infringement would clearly apply (such

as disallowance of only insignificant alterations, which could be exploited by pirates to evade copyright), but decisions for now must rely on the determination of the fact-finders without well-developed guidance from the court. Given the diversity and complexity in contemporary dance, it is unlikely that any simple tests of similarity will or should be developed.

A crucial comparison between substantial similarity in copyright infringement and philosophical identity is the role of notation or, more broadly, fixation in a tangible medium. To be eligible for copyright protection, works must be "fixed in any tangible medium of expression, now known or later developed, from which they can be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated, either directly or with the aid of a machine or device." (122) The legislative history of the Copyright Act emphasizes the flexibility available in the choice of medium, "to avoid the artificial and largely unjustifiable distinction . . . under which statutory copyrightability in certain cases has been made to depend upon the form or medium in which the work is fixed." (123) However, there is no hint in the legislative history that Congress specifically considered the use of film and notation in dance.

Choreographic works can be fixed through films, videotape, or a written notational system. Detailed verbal descriptions using standard ballet vocabulary would also seem acceptable. Fixation through film or videotape records

every element of a performance, including the interpretation of particular dancers, (124) resulting in a copyrighted work considerably more detailed than written notation could provide. The resulting problems do not seem to have been recognized by the drafters of the new copyright law.

First, the interpretations of individual performers which would be recorded on film or videotape have traditionally been excluded from protection, (125) although some courts have included these interpretations in the protected work if recorded in some way. (126) It could thus be argued that all interpretive aspects of a performance fixed on film or videotape are protected. If such interpretive elements are not included in the protected work, it would often be impossible to identify which aspects were part of the choreographic work and which were the interpretive contributions of the performers. Many interpretive elements could conceivably be the work of either the performer or the choreographer (e.g., a certain turn of the head, facial expression or phrasing of the steps). Another problem is whether the choreographer should be considered the "author" (and thus eligible for copyright protection) of those interpretive elements recorded on film, but contributed by the performer. For simplicity, there could be a presumption that the choreographer has contributed all protected elements of the work, including "interpretive" elements, with the burden on a challenger to show otherwise. It might also be argued that the dancers and the choreographer should be

considered joint authors.

Another problem resulting from the possibility of multiple fixation is determination of what constitutes the choreographic work protected by copyright when there are discrepancies between the visual recording and written notation, when both fixations have been deposited with the Copyright Office. Should the protected work consist only of those elements shred by both forms of fixation? Should the film be seen as a supplement to the more skeletal written notation? The distinctive elements captured only on film might be precisely the characteristics best showing substantial similarity or originality in an infringement suit. It could be argued, however, that the discrepancies constitute, prima facie, the interpretive and unprotected elements of the work, that is, the nonessential characteristics for te purpose of identity.

Another issue is whether common law protection would be available under state law for those aspects of works which are not fixed. (127) If a work is revised considerably, by the choreographer, from the fixed copy, it could be argued that the revisions, if unfixed, should constitute a new work protected at common law. (128)

Another issue concerns the actual performances to be compared in determining infringement. If a written notation was deposited for the copyrighted work, a performance would have to be reconstructed from the notation for the court, since so few people can read such notations. It is

uncertain whether this reconstructed performance should be supervised by the copyright owner or a neutral party to ensure reconstruction of only those notated aspects. The choice of party to oversee this reconstruction could critically affect the outcome of the case. It is also not clear how to compare an allegedly infringing performance, which had not been recorded, with a protected work.

Despite these numerous significant issues involving the method of fixation, the initial response under the new statute by choreographers seems motivated mainly by economic considerations, with preference for substantially less expensive videotape over notation. (129)

In summary, infringement and identity theories share several important characteristics. In both, the aesthetic, economic, or other value of a work is irrelevant in determinations of similarity. Thus, in both, care must be taken in analyzing statements that "This is not Work X" to be certain that this is not really an elliptical claim that "this is not a good performance of Work X." Both involve a search for tests of sameness. In both the choreographer makes decisions about what constitutes the work. For example, in copyright, the choreographer must decide what notation and/or film is submitted to the copyright office. For performances, he or she must decide what work is presented, initially and often in reconstructions of the work. In both spheres, the reconstructions of others might also be found similar to the choreographer's intended version. (130)

Infringement and identity theories also differ in significant ways. Only in infringement theory is actual copying and access relevant. Even so, this does not affect a finding of substantial similarity, but only the degree of similarity which must be proven. That is, the history of production (whether or not there was access) is not relevant to the finding of substantial similarity by a jury. In contrast, some identity theories claim that history of production is essential in establishing identity, but that has been challenged here.

Another important difference is that infringement is found where there is similarity of the whole or of some major part of the work, while identity pertains only to the work as an entirety. Infringement could be a major part of a movement design or it could be of the movement design but not of the other media (music, scenery, etc.) protected under different categories of copyright. Infringement of a significant part of a work is not the same as identity of a work as an entirety. Identity theory thus involves additional factors but the method (notation plus lay observer test, e.g.,) need not necessarily be different.

Another difference is the importance of degrees of similarity. Infringement involves findings of various degrees of similarity (depending on the degree of access shown), while identity theory is interested in absolute similarity. It is suggested here that because of the complexity of dance and the uncertainty of identity standards, philo-

sophers could fruitfully look at degrees of similarity to understand how identity is established.

Another significant difference is that infringement theory ignores trivial or minor differences in works, not because of the belief that such differences are necessarily irrelevant to a showing of similarity, but rather because recognizing such differences as reducing similarity would invite and tolerate plagiarists and pirates. This motivation is not present in identity theory, but it could incorporate the same lack of interest in minor differences on the grounds that they do not affect the perceptions of ordinary observers, a secondary motivation in infringement theory.

Another difference is the absence in identity theory of various statutory prerequisites and exemptions to a showing of infringement, including originality, the "public domain," and the "fair use" exemption, but these are not relevant to the test of substantial similarity. Copyright is concerned primarily with protection of the economic right of use of intellectual property; substantial similarity is only one element of that right.

Identity and infringement theories differ in their underlying purpose and motivation. Copyright rests on the assumption that economic motivation will encourage creativity. If similarity is sufficiently substantial that potential consumers of the creation will be misled into purchasing the infringing work, that economic benefit will be

denied to the true author. The test thus rests squarely on the perceptions of ordinary observers and potential consumers. No such motivation exists explicitly in philosophical identity theory, but it is important to try to specify purposes for identity theory. It is possible that identity standards could differ depending on the purpose. For the purpose of criticism, works must be identified so they can be compared in different performances by different artists. As critical evaluation is, in part, evaluation of the quality of performance of a given work, that work must be identified to make such comparisons. Criticism also involves comparison if the aesthetic value of different choreographic designs. In order for such comparisons to be meaningful for a reader, the work must be identifiable by the interested readership. Identity theory also strives to lay the theoretical groundwork and understanding which would explain the development of notational systems and such practical applications as the copyright system.

Conclusions

The proposal here is that identity in dance is best understood as a matter of both (1) a written notation which provides an ideal or absolute benchmark for identity, and (2) agreements among ordinary observers of dance at a particular time and with regard to particular types of works regarding the necessary sort of compliance with the notation. These agreements are like the guidelines for ordinary observers in infringement cases. For example, the mere

presence of standardized movements, in itself, does not constitute similarity or identity, but a recognizable movement phrase, analogous to a melody line in music, does contribute to finding similarity. A trivial difference such as a different placement of the head does not detract from a finding of identity. These guidelines can be identified and verbalized by looking at actual practice in the dance world. The task of identifying these guidelines is a continuing responsibility of critics, copyright lawyers, choreographers, and other members of the dance world.

Notation plays an important, but not the only, role in establishing identity. It provides a standard against which acceptable variations can be assessed. It reflects growing standardization in dance with regard to characterizing movements, although the standard for an entire work consists of both a notation (either actual or constructable) against which deviations can be assessed following ordinary observer guidelines.

This two-pronged proposal explains why, although both Giselle and a Balanchine ballet can be notated, the variation tolerated from those notations is so different. The acceptable variation is a reflection of different ordinary observer guidelines. The guidelines for nineteenth-century classics emphasize consistency with dramatic mood and plot with great tolerance for variations in steps. Those for a work by Balanchine emphasize close adherence to the notated steps. There is a trend toward the latter, reflecting

growing interest in the creative aspects of choreographic designs as opposed to the interpretive aspects of individual performers. But many of these genres still co-exist in dance, with different identity standards.

This dual test of identity accommodates a built-in limit on absolute identity in dance, namely, the nonuniformity of the human instrument in the artform. It also accommodates the numerous variations possible because the many media in dance can be combined with different emphasis on particular media in different dance genre.

The approach of the law to infringement of copyright does not provide any easy answers, but it does suggest basic guidelines for better understanding identity. First, the ultimate test and thus the final object of analysis should be the reaction of lay observers to actual performances, including how much and what kind of similarity is needed to establish identity. Notational analysis is useful to the extent that it explicates and clarifies those practices. Second, a broader sense of "fixation" rather than notation is a more generous tool which serves the purpose of removing the record of dance from fallible human memory, while recording interpretive nuances not included in the notation and for which there is not a clear distinction between essential and non-essential performance aspects.

Theories which explain identity in other artforms can be extended to dance only with great caution, because of the complexity of the artform, the unique role of the human

body as instrument, and the very recent development of dance as an artform. But philosophical analysis can be used quite productively in understanding the way in which people actually establish identity.

NOTES

(1) The Nutcracker is an extreme example of a ballet produced by numerous companies, productions sharing only the Tchaikovsky score and the scenario. See, e.g., Alan M. Kriegsman, "'Nutcracker' Theme and Variations," Washington Post, December 23, 1975. George Balanchine claims that the numerous versions are "about the same" in "story and action," as well, of course, as the music. George Balanchine and Francis Mason, Balanchine's Complete Stories of the Great Ballets (Garden City, N.J.: Doubleday & Co., Inc., 1977), p. 413. This extreme case presents the question whether audiences really treat all these versions as the same ballet or as different versions of the same ballet. Or as different ballets sharing only story and music. Although the answer is not clear, the latter characterization is probably most accurate. Return to text

(2) "Tinkering with the traditional versions of the nineteenth-century ballets occurs all the time everywhere." Walter Sorell, The Dancers' Image: Points and Counterpoints (New York: Columbia University Press, 1971), p. 65

Changes are also made in new ballets. A very recent example is The Four Seasons, created for the New York City Ballet in 1979. Jerome Robbins choreographed two entirely different solos to different music for Peter Martins and Mikhail Baryshnikov, alternating as the lead male dancers. Critic Arlene Croce refers to these as "two versions" of the work. "Other Verdi Variations," New Yorker, February 5, 1979, p. 114. Their partners, Patricia McBride and Suzanne Farrell, performed solos similar choreographically, except that McBride ". . . does chaines piques instead of the string of double soutenu turns that Farrell knocks off." Ibid., p. 116. Performances seen by this writer, New York State Theater, with Mikhail Baryshnikov, January 18, 1979; Kennedy Center, with Mikhail Baryshnikov, February 22, 1979; with peter martins, February 24, 1979.

Names are sometimes the only thing changed, as with the change of Balanchine's Le Palais de Cristal to Symphony in C. Jack Anderson, "Ballet: City's 'Symphony in C' Is a Crystal Palace," New York Times, January 9, 1979. Return to text

(3) The nineteenth-century story-ballets normally included much mime to convey the dramatic action. The mime in those ballets surviving in current repertories is almost always reduced or eliminated.

For example, in Balanchine's version of Coppelia, first performed in 1974, "The mime passages have been quickened, compressed, and in some instances threaded directly into the dancing." Alan M. Kriegsman, "A Sparkling 'Coppelia,'" Washington Post, February 21, 1976. Alexandra Danilova, who assisted with the production is reported to have said:

"'Some things, like the mime, I speeded up.' . . . 'Some things must be made acceptable to our time.'" Hubert Saal, "Saratoga Smiles," Newsweek, July 29, 1974.

In the Coppelia by American Ballet Theatre, first presented in 1968, guest Paolo ". . . Bortoluzzi tends to substitute naturalistic gestures for the conventional mime required for 19^th-century ballet." Anna Kisselgoff, "2 Stars From Italy Join In a Spirited 'Coppelia,'" New York Times, January 12, 1976.

Productions of Swan Lake also illustrate the wide variance in the use of mime. See, e.g., Arlene Croce, "The Royal Line," New Yorker, May 17, 1975, p. 162; Clive Barnes, "Ballet: 2 Remarkable Local Debuts," New York Times, May 12, 1975. Return to text

(4) For example, Erik Bruhn's version of Swan Lake for the National Ballet of Canada, which retains most of the original Petipa choreography, though adding some new passages, develops a very unusual psychological, Freudian view of the Prince. The evil Rothbart is portrayed by a woman resembling the Prince's mother. Anna Kisselgoff, "Ballet: Canadians Dance Their Own 'Swan Lake,'" New York Times, July 28, 1978; Tobi Tobias, "'I Am Not Finished as a Dancer,'" New York Times, June 29, 1975; Clive Barnes, "Nadia Potts Is a Stylish and Distinctive Odette-Odile," New York Times, August 5, 1975. Mikhail Baryshnikov, Baryshnikov at Work, Charles Engell France, ed. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1976), pp. 153-5.

". . . though all productions of [the nineteenth-century ballet Coppelia] tell the same tale, they can look different because of the various interpretations choreographers may give to the events of the scenario. Some "Coppelia's" are farcical. Some are macabre. Others are fables about the folly of infatuation. Still others emphasize Swanilda's wit and cleverness - and even her touch of bossiness. . . ." Jack Anderson, "Cuban Ballet Performs an Unfamiliar 'Coppelia,'" New York Times, June 17, 1978.

Baryshnikov's performance of Balanchine's Apollo has been described as ". . . the most Dionysian Apollo we have seen . . . Very obviously, Mr. Baryshnikov does not see the ballet as an allegory about virtues of classical art. Its usual serenity has been broken by the realism he has imposed in angst-laden acting upon the stylized movement." Anna Kisselgoff, "Dance: Baryshnikov Star of Festival," New York Times, June 12, 1978; see also, Anna Kisselgoff, "Dance: Festival shows Baryshnikov at Work," New York Times, June 13, 1978.

Rudolf Nureyev's production of Romeo and Juliet for London Festival Ballet, a ballet produced by many choreographers and companies, emphasizes the theme of fate throughout the work. Anna Kisselgoff, "Ballet: Nureyev's Interpretation of 'Romeo,'" New York Times, July 20, 1978; Alan M.

Kriegsman, "Stalking Rudolf Nureyev," Washington Post, August 6, 1978; Deborah Jowitt, "Slugging It Out in Verona," Village Voice, August 14, 1978. Kisselgoff also says the production ". . . is really more about Romeo and his friends than about Romeo and Juliet." "A New Juliet by Londoners At the Met," New York Times, July 22, 1978. Kriegsman characterizes the production as "more starkly medieval than wantonly Elizabethan. . . ." "Nureyev Is 'Romeo,'" Washington Post, August 2, 1978.

Oscar Araiz' version for the Joffrey Ballet uses three different dancers as Juliet to develop the various facets of the heroine. Jennifer Dunning, "'Romeo and Juliet' by Araiz Is Danced by the Joffrey Ballet," New York Times, November 12, 1978. Return to text

(5) For example, in Balanchine's revival of Coppelia, Delibes' traditional score is ". . . restored to uncut proportions, with some interpolations from other Delibes ballets. . . ." Alan M. Kriegsman, "A Sparkling 'Coppelia,'" Washington Post, February 21, 1976; see also, Arlene Croce, "I have Made You and You Are Beautiful," New Yorker, August 5, 1974, pp. 75-7. Return to text

(6) For example, the order and length of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake has been altered frequently. See Humphrey Searle, Ballet Music (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1973), pp. 69-73.

A comment by Alan Kriegsman is typical of critical acceptance of such musical changes: "The fracturing and rearrangement of the music [Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet], for instance - a choreographer uses music to serve the ends of the dance, and what's valid is what works." "The Esthetic Gimmickry of Araiz's 'Romeo and Juliet,'" Washington Post, August 4, 1978. Return to text

(7) Arlene Croce reports "some outcry" from the audience about choreographic changes by Gelsey Kirkland in Swan Lake (e.g., "Her entrance in the coda eliminated the fouetté in the half turn into arabesque, and so another Odette cameo was partially erased"), but Croce says ". . . the only sensible objection to altered text in 'the classics' is to wrongness of effect. I'd have preferred some bright substitution for the standard relevé-passé/entrechat sequence, which, with Kirkland's thin thighs and calves, has no dazzle. But even though this Odette abjured dazzle, the overwhelming impression she left of originality and power was not damages." "Beyond Ballet Theatre," New Yorker, July 4, 1977.

Clive Barnes also speaks approvingly of certain changes: "In the classics the Bolshoi Ballet has traditionally permitted its chief interpreters considerable leeway in individual characterizations. It is a principle, sometimes

followed in the West, that has a lot to comment it, for dancers instead of feeling themselves encased with the unbreakable confines of a production, are given a little, precious room to move, the change to interpret a role themselves, rather than merely to execute someone else's interpretation." "Ballet: the Bolshoi Scores With 'Giselle,'" New York Times, May 2, 1975.

On rare occasions, critics hint at a limit to changes beyond which a work ceases to be the "same" work. E.g., Marcia Siegel says: "I would like to see some choreographer restudy the whole of Swan Lake, unify all its elements, throw out the pantomime and audience-wooing and old-time hokum, and create a clean, dramatically believable story ballet out of the material. But then, of course, it wouldn't be Swan Lake." At the Vanishing Point (New York: Saturday Review Press, 1972), pp. 56-7. Interestingly, she does not hint at loss of identity as Swan Lake in an earlier discussion of a radically different version: "George Balanchine's version of Swan Lake, consisting of the second act only, is a more acceptable solution. Without sacrificing the dance experience, he dispenses with superfluities of plot, spectacle, divertissement, and stereotyped character and concentrates on the encounter between the Prince and the Swan Queen . . . . Pantomime is employed sparingly, and he lets his dancers make use of the expressive possibilities within the ballet technique." Ibid., p. 56.

Another rare example of changes in Swan Lake so radical that it was considered by some to have lost its identity was Mikhail Mordkin's 1938 version for Ballet Theatre, a one-act version retaining only the music, with a cast including The Ideal, the Poet, and the Protective Fates (the Black Maidens). In 1940, he added the traditional first act pas de trois, danced by cygnets and a huntsman, instead of the usual party guests. Charles Payne characterizes this "tone-poem version" as a "different" ballet. American Ballet Theatre (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1978), p. 39. Return to text

(8) Such changes are apparently as unacceptable in opera as in the concert hall, despite opera's use of unique human voices (similar in uniqueness to the role of human bodies in dance). At a recent performance of Don Carlo, mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne was booed for singing "O don fatale," in the key of F instead of A, although Horne insisted that Verdi had originally planned the aria in F. "Marilyn Horne Booed for Doing Her Homework," New York Times, February 8, 1979. Return to text

(9) See, David Blair, Program Notes, Giselle, American Ballet Theatre, Kennedy Center, April 4, 1976, p. 22B; George Balanchine and Francis Mason, Balanchine's Complete Stories of the Great Ballets, pp. 280-292. Return to text

(10) It is well-established that the French choreographer Marius Petipa made many revision in the choreography during his career in St. Petersburg in the latter half of the nineteenth century, as have numerous others. See, e.g., David Blair, "Historical Background of Giselle," in Kennedy Center, April, 1976, p. 22B; Erik Bruhn, "Restaging the Classics," in Payne, American Ballet Theatre, pp. 326-7. Today, many changes in the choreography are still common in surviving productions. These range from doing a series of leaps and whirls instead of a usual walk to replacing a familiar series of assembles with a different jump. Clive Barnes notes of Vladimir Vasiliev, as Albrecht in the Bolshoi Ballet's production: "After his entrance he does not merely walk to Giselle's house, as is the custom, but leaps over in a couple of grand jetes, and whirls back in a series of chaine turns. Such untoward fireworks might have been totally inappropriate, but here they appeared just right." "Ballet: The Bolshoi Scores With 'Giselle,'" New York Times, May 2, 1975. Anna Kisselgoff says of a performance by Eleanor D'Antuono with American Ballet Theatre: "[She] was in error when she destroyed the traditional symmetry of Albrecht's and Giselle's doing assembles together. Instead she inserted a pointless diamond-shaped jump." "Ballet: Basic 'Giselle,'" New York Times, December 28, 1975. But Kisselgoff does not hint at any loss of identity for this "error."

In the Cuban production, "Even when there is new choreography by Miss Alonso, it has logic. The peasant pas de deux of Act I is now danced by six girls and four boys and these girls are Giselle's usual six friends." Anna Kisselgoff, "Dance: Miss Alonso Stars in 'Giselle,'" New York Times, June 15, 1978. Many other changes in the Cuban version are described by Alonso herself in "Performing Giselle," in Payne, American Ballet Theatre, pp. 341-2.

The new production by London Festival Ballet restores many choreographic elements of the original version changed in productions over the last century. As described by Anna Kisselgoff: "Essentially, it is a version that acknowledges a romantic trademark in ballet - the expressive power of movement. The mime is not subordinate, it is in fact more frequent and clearer than in many productions. But there are also dance passages restored and additional choreography by Miss [Mary] Skeaping, with changes in sequence. In Act I, she has moved up the usual peasant Pas de Deux, to the traditional Borgmuller music, and shortened it by a solo for each dancer. Giselle's solo, also considered an interpolation, now follows this pas de deux and is part of the entertainment for the aristocratic hunting party. By contrast, the vendange dance has been lengthened, using the restored Adolphe Adam music for a new pas de deux, including new solos for Giselle, the peasant girl courted by Albrecht, the count in disguise. Act II . . . contains the most dramatic restorations. The misty opening forest scene

not only shows a group of gamekeepers and Hilarion . . . stunned by the sudden shadowy appearance of wilis, but it also presages the highly effective and ghostly new scene in which the men are literally surrounding by these menacing maidens and a Myrtha leaping among all. Much has been written about a passage called the wilis fugue, in which the wilis attack Giselle and Albrecht as they stand protected by the cross at her grave. Miss Skeaping has restored this section, giving it a whirlwind quality, interesting but not as dramatic as expected." "London Festival Ballet in Skeaping 'Giselle,'" New York Times, July 23, 1978. See also, David Vaughan, "Revivals, 1976," Ballet Review, VI (No. 1, 1977-78), 33-4; Alan M. Kriegsman, "Standing Ovation for A Superb 'Giselle,'" Washington Post, August 10, 1978. Return to text

(11) For example, the lilies pas de deux, Albrecht's solo, and the ensembles for the Wilis in Act II are rarely altered. Return to text

(12) One striking change was the ending of the ballet, when Giselle returns to her grave and Albrecht departs. In the earliest performances, his fiancee Bathilde appeared at the close of the ballet and forgave him, but this was dropped in later nineteenth-century productions. See, e.g., Sorell, Dancer's Image, p. 421.

Another variation is the cause of Giselle's death in the first act. In the original version, she had a heart condition, went made upon learning of Albrecht's deception, and died from the weak heart. See, e.g., Sorell, Dancer's Image, p. 67. In American Ballet Theatre's production, Giselle is portrayed simply as sickly, and she dies of "a broken heart." Program Notes, Kennedy Center, April, 1976, p. 22A. In other performances, including that of the English Lynn Seymour, Giselle dies by stabbing herself to death. "Reverting to ballet tradition, Miss Seymour's Giselle stabbed herself in Act I. To expire of a broken heart would have been too pallid for this dramatic heroine so willing to die for love." Anna Kisselgoff, "Ballet: 'Giselle' Via Lynn Seymour," New York Times, June 12, 1976. Return to text

(13) In current productions, there is still great variation in the departure of Albrecht from the grave. Ivan Nagy pauses briefly to watch Giselle re-enter her grave, then turns his back, picks up his cape, and walks across the stage. In sharp contrast, Mikhail Baryshnikov, stunned and remorseful, stares intensely at the grave as he impulsively picks up an armful of lilies on the ground. He then walks slowly backward across stage, dropping lilies on the ground unknowingly as he continues to stare in horror at the grave. He finally looks down at the one remaining lily in his hand, looks again at the grave, and throws himself on the floor. These differences are consistent with Nagy's interpretation

of Albrecht as something of a cad with a short-lived touch of remorse and Baryshnikov's interpretation of Albrecht as truly falling in love with Giselle and feeling deep anguish over his original deception. Performances seen by this writer, American Ballet Theatre, Kennedy Center, April 4, matinee and evening.

Indeed, there are almost as many endings as there have been Albrecht's Christopher Lyall of the English Ballet Rambert wandered in a daze all over the stage and then threw himself on the grave. Giselle: Act II, Ballet Rambert, 1959 (film). Anton Dolin gave a very melodramatic ending, clutching at himself and finally throwing himself on the ground. Giselle: Excerpts, Ballet Theatre [n.d.] (film). Films seen by this writer at the Jerome S. Robbins Film Archives, Dance Research collection, New York City Public Library, Lincoln Center.

The interpretation of Vladimir Vasiliev of the Bolshoi is described by Clive Barnes: "His Albrecht seems quite unlike anyone else's. He does not play the role as a caddish noble seducer, but rather as a man caught by circumstances, hopelessly in love with the peasant girl Giselle, and forced into a deception that fills him with guilt. In the second act he approaches Giselle's grave like a man in a trance. He even abstractedly drops a flower and stoops to pick it up, hardly knowing or caring where he is or what he is doing." "Ballet: The Bolshoi Scores With 'Giselle,'" New York Times, May 2, 1975.

At the end of Act I in some versions, Albrecht is pulled away from the dead Giselle by townspeople as an outsider; in others, he stays by her side as the curtain comes down. See, e.g., Anna Kisselgoff, "Ballet: Basic 'Giselle,'" New York Times, December 28, 1975. Erik Bruhn explains the difference as that between a cad who allows himself to be pulled away and one truly in love with Giselle, who refuses to leave her side as she dies. "Restaging the Classics," in Payne, American Ballet Theater, p. 325. See also, Mikhail Baryshnikov's rationale for the latter interpretation, Baryshnikov at Work, pp. 26-34.

Clive Barnes also notes that Hilarion, the suitor rejected by Giselle for Albrecht, used to be played as a villain, but now is usually presented as "likable." "Ballet: Fine Baryshnikov and Makarova in 'Giselle,'" New York Times, January 7, 1975; see also, Alan M. Kriegsman, "Ballet Nacional de Cuba," Washington Post, June 12, 1978: "Unlike most Hilarions one sees, he emphasized not a spiteful, bruised ego, but adoration for Giselle and heartbreak over her collapse - he was so compelling one wondered why Giselle ever turned him down." Return to text

(14) Quite common are changes in small dramatic details, such as the way Albrecht first gets Giselle's attention, how Giselle hides from her mother, or who pours the wine for the royal party. It is especially instructive to note that many

differences in performances by the same company. In performances seen by this writer on April 4, 1975, of American Ballet Theatre's production of Giselle, Marianna Tcherkassky and Mikhail Baryshnikov led the cast at the matinee, and Natalia Makarova and Ivay Nagy performed in the evening, with numerous differences in detail. Nagy first got Giselle's attention by making kissing noises, while Baryshnikov clapped his hands. Makarova hid from her mother by vanishing into the crowd of peasants, while Tcherkassky follows the most common practice of crouching behind Baryshnikov. In Makarova's performance, the wine for the royal party in the first act was poured and served by her mother, while Tcherkassky did this herself. Makarova knelt to kiss the hem of the dress worn by the Princess, while Tcherkassky rubbed her cheek against the garment near the waist. Such small differences are quite common in different performances of the ballet, but they are especially striking when they occur in performances by the same company on the same day with almost identical casts, except for the lead roles. Return to text

(15) For example, the recent production by the National Ballet of Cuba actually reinserts some old time by Giselle's mother telling of Giselle's possible doom. Anna Kisselgoff, "Dance: Miss Alonso Stars in 'Giselle,'" New York Times, June 15, 1978; see also, Erik Bruhn, "Restaging the Classics," in Payne, American Ballet Theatre, p. 326. Return to text

(16) Contemporary companies commonly alter the original score by repeating various passages. The current ABT production, for example, repeats such passages as the first act arrival of the royal party and the Wilis theme in the second act during the famous passage in which the corps moves across stage in a cantilevered arabesq