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Anna Sokolow

 
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Anna Sokolow
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(born Feb. 9, 1910, Hartford, Conn., U.S. — died March 29, 2000, New York, N.Y.) U.S. modern dancer, choreographer, and teacher. She studied with Martha Graham and danced with Graham's company (1930 – 38). In the early 1930s she also formed her own dance group, the Dance Unit. From 1939 to 1949 she spent part of each year as a teacher and choreographer in Mexico City, where she formed Mexico's first modern-dance group. Throughout her career and into the 1990s, she continued to form various companies and for them she often choreographed works on subjects of social concern.

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Dictionary of Dance: Anna Sokolow
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Sokolow, Anna (b Hartford, Conn., 9 Feb. 1910, d New York, 29 Mar. 2000). US dancer, choreographer, and teacher. She studied with various teachers including Graham and Horst and at the New York Metropolitan Opera Ballet School, leaving home at 15 to join Graham's company with which she danced until 1938. In 1934 she formed the first of several temporary companies which performed until the late 1960s. From the beginning her work dealt with social issues, for instance in Slaughter of the Innocents (mus. Alex North, 1934), and throughout her career she remained uncompromising both in her choice of harrowing contemporary subject-matter, such as the Spanish Civil War and the Holocaust, and in the bleak realism of her handling of themes such as urban alienation. In 1939 she began working as a choreographer and teacher in Mexico City where she founded the first Mexican modern dance company, La Paloma Azul. She frequently returned there and created some of her most important works, including Lyric Suite (mus. Berg, 1953) and Dreams (mus. Bach and Webern, 1961). She stopped dancing in 1954 but continued choreographing, mostly for her own company in the US, including Rooms (mus. Hopkins, 1955) and Steps of Silence (mus. Vieru, 1968). She also worked in opera and musicals, choreographing Candide (1956) and the off-Broadway production of Hair—she is credited with much of its staging though her name was excised from the credits. She occasionally choreographed for other dance companies including Netherlands Dance Theatre (The Seven Deadly Sins, mus. Weill, 1967), Ballet Rambert (Deserts, mus. Varèse, 1967), and Batsheva Dance Company (In memoriam No. 52436, mus. Baird, 1973). For many years she taught at the Juilliard.

Wikipedia: Anna Sokolow
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Anna Sokolow

Anna Sokolow (February 9, 1910, Hartford, Connecticut – March 29, 2000 in New York City, New York) was a Jewish American dancer and choreographer.

Contents

Training

Sokolow began studying dance and performing with instructors at the Emanuel Sisterhood Settlement House; in early adolescence, she left school to train full time.[1] She began studying in earnest at what became the Neighborhood Playhouse, where her teachers included Blanche Talmud, Bird Larson, Martha Graham and Louis Horst.[2]

Career

She started her professional career in 1929 as a member of Martha Graham's company. Beginning in the 1930s, she affiliated herself with the politicized "radical dance" movement, out of which developed her work Anti-War Trilogy (1933).[3] By 1936, she had organized her first company, Dance Unit. Sokolow was also associated with the socially conscious collective the New Dance Group and the larger Workers Dance League. According to dance historian Ellen Graff, Sokolow's work with these groups was instrumental in transforming the "agitprop style" associated with early political dance by melding it with "emerging professional and artistic standards in 'new' dance."[4] Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, she performed and choreographed both solo and ensemble works, which tackled subject matter that included the exploitation of workers and growing troubles of Jews in Germany. Several works from this period, including Anti-War Trilogy, were set to music by the composer Alex North.[5]

In 1939, Sokolow began a life-long association with the dance in Mexico and Israel. Her work for the Mexican Ministry of Fine Arts facilitated the establishment of the National Academy of Dance. In Israel, she choreographed for major dance companies, including Batsheva, Inbal, and the Lyric Theatre.

Sokolow created works full of dramatic contemporary imagery, revealing the full spectrum of human experience and reflecting the tension and alienation of her time. Rooms (1955) dealt with urban alienation, while Dreams (1961) grew from the horrors of the Holocaust. Other major modern dance works included Lyric Suite (1954), Odes (1965), and Opus 65 (1965). In 1991, Anna Kisselgoff summed up Sokolow's aesthetic as "American Expressionism," and commented that "Stillness is a large part of her choreography, and Miss Sokolow can sum up a state of being -- an entire society -- in an arrested pose."[6]

In addition to her work as a choreographer, Sokolow was also an influential teacher of both dance and movement for actors. At Juilliard, she taught what she called "method dancing" from 1958 to 1993.[7]

Repertory

Since the dispersal of Anna Sokolow's company -- Players' Project -- in 2004, its former co-artistic directors have formed separate institutions to maintain Sokolow's Legacy.

The Sokolow Theatre Dance Ensemble [1]performs Sokolow's repertory plus contemporary choreographies under the direction of Jim May.

Sokolow Now!, the archival dance company of the Sokolow Dance Foundation, performs Sokolow's repertory exclusively and is under the direction of Lorry May. The foundation, [2] also offers unique educational programs and actively licenses and reconstructs Sokolow's works.

Many Sokolow's works were filmed and are held at the New York Public Library in its Dance Division.

Works for Broadway

References

  1. ^ Larry Warren, Anna Sokolow: The Rebellious Spirit (London and New York: Routledge, 1998), 8. ISBN 9057021846.
  2. ^ Warren, Anna Sokolow, 11-17.
  3. ^ Anna Sokolow: Radical Dance. Accessed 1-3-2008.
  4. ^ Ellen Graff, Stepping Left: Dance and Politics in New York City, 1928-1942 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1997), 52-53. ISBN 0822319489.
  5. ^ Sanya Shoilevska Henderson, Alex North, Film Composer (Jefferson, NC: McFarland Press, 2003), 226. ISBN 0786414707.
  6. ^ Anna Kisselgoff, "Sokolow Takes a Bow for 50 Years," New York Times 20-1-1991. Accessed 1-3-2008.
  7. ^ Andrea Olmstead, Juilliard: A History (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1999), 202-203. ISBN 0252071069.

External links


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Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
Dictionary of Dance. The Oxford Dictionary of Dance. Copyright © 2000, 2004 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Anna Sokolow".  Read more