Merce Cunningham is internationally recognized as a master of post-modernism. He was born in the State of Washington, and began his career as a soloist with the Martha Graham Company from 1939 to 1945. He formed his own company in 1953 at Black Mountain College, the progressive liberal arts school near Asheville, North Carolina. John Cage was music director and worked together with the Company until his death in 1992. From 1954-64
Robert Rauschenberg was the Company’s resident designer. There were other celebrated collaborations with visual artists such as
Jasper Johns, Frank Stella, Andy Warhol, Robert Morris and
Bruce Nauman, among many others.
As a dancer, Cunningham was a virtuosic presence on the stage and, as a choreographer, has been and continues to be a master and an innovator. While he has created nearly 200 works for his company, there is always change and renewal, as the work is refreshed by new challenges and technological advances over the years, including the use of video, computer, film and technologies such as motion capture technology that was used in his 1999 work
Biped.
Using chance techniques such as dice-rolling and coin-flipping to determine movement, he created abstract choreography, and his interest in technology has led him to pioneer a new choreography tool, the computer program "Life Forms" (now called "Dance Forms") to create his dances since 1991.
His influence in dance and theater has been enormous, as he constantly pushed boundaries and challenged conventions. Most particularly his sense of the dance as an evolving organic presence with the music and décor as separate but equal partners has been important not only for the development of dance, but also for music and visual art.
For the 50th year anniversary celebration in 2003, the Merce Cunningham Company presented revivals of important works at the Lincoln Center Festival in New York, and performed at European festivals as well. His most recent work, Fluid Canvas, premiered at the Barbican Centre in London. This year, Cunningham’s longest and grandest work, "Ocean," opened the Lincoln Center Festival. The intricate 90-minute production was his last collaboration with John Cage who devised the work with him in 1991.
Cunningham says, "The human body is limited. But within the framework of what is possible, variety is endless."
Merce Cunningham is internationally recognized as a master of post-modernism. He was born in the State of Washington, and began his career as a soloist with the Martha Graham Company from 1939 to 1945. He formed his own company in 1953 at Black Mountain College, the progressive liberal arts school near Asheville, North Carolina. John Cage was music director and worked together with the Company until his death in 1992. From 1954-64
Robert Rauschenberg was the Company’s resident designer. There were other celebrated collaborations with visual artists such as
Jasper Johns, Frank Stella, Andy Warhol, Robert Morris and
Bruce Nauman, among many others.
As a dancer, Cunningham was a virtuosic presence on the stage and, as a choreographer, has been and continues to be a master and an innovator. While he has created nearly 200 works for his company, there is always change and renewal, as the work is refreshed by new challenges and technological advances over the years, including the use of video, computer, film and technologies such as motion capture technology that was used in his 1999 work
Biped.Using chance techniques such as dice-rolling and coin-flipping to determine movement, he created abstract choreography, and his interest in technology has led him to pioneer a new choreography tool, the computer program
Life Forms (now called
Dance Forms) to create his dances since 1991.
His influence in dance and theater has been enormous, as he constantly pushed boundaries and challenged conventions. Most particularly his sense of the dance as an evolving organic presence with the music and décor as separate but equal partners has been important not only for the development of dance, but also for music and visual art.
For the 50th year anniversary celebration in 2003, the Merce Cunningham Company presented revivals of important works at the Lincoln Center Festival in New York, and performed at European festivals as well. His most recent work,
Fluid Canvas, premiered at the Barbican Centre in London. This year, Cunningham’s longest and grandest work
Ocean, opened the Lincoln Center Festival. The intricate 90-minute production was his last collaboration with John Cage who devised the work with him in 1991.
Cunningham says, "The human body is limited. But within the framework of what is possible, variety is endless."
He passed away on July 26, 2009, New York
