Re-Learning Dance

One of the best dance routines I’ve ever watched.

https://mymodernmet.com/cab-calloway-jumpin-jive-nicholas-brothers/

Here’s a clip of them from seven years earlier:

Performed by: Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater

Number: “Wade in the Water”

Choreographer: Alvin Ailey

Style: Modern

#ActsofPride Day 11 - Favorite LGBTQIA+ historical figure

“Each time I leaped I seemed to touch the sky, and when I regained earth it seemed to be mine alone.” - Josephine Baker



Tumblr Creatr @Rose contributed this original work based on today’s prompt celebrating the iconic Josephine Baker. The American-born world renowned Black bisexual dancer, actress, singer, civil rights champion, and WWII French resistance agent rose to fame in the 1920s and quickly became one of the most famous entertainers in her adopted home of France. Pablo Picasso and Earnest Hemingway were also huge fans.

The artist told us a little about why Baker inspires her:

“Josephine Baker was hailed as ‘The Black Venus’ by fellow artists of her time. Though she fled the oppression she faced in America in 1925 to live the majority of her life in France, she returned often to fight for civil rights, speaking alongside Martin Luther King Jr. at the March on Washington. Now more than ever, it is vital to lift up queer Black lives and histories, and Josephine’s is one of pure resilience, love, and absolute joy” 

“Go within every day and find the inner strength so that the world will not blow your candle out.”-Katherine Dunham

Best known as a choreographer, Kennedy Center Honoree Katherine Dunham created one of the first all-black dance troupes, Ballet Nègre, that successfully toured internationally. She cultivated an infusion of Afro-Caribbean style in the development of her Dunham Technique, where undulation of the body is independently accentuated. Over the course of her life, Dunham would encompass a richly versed, highly prolific career. She would choreograph a new version of the production of Aida for New York’s Metropolitan Opera, collaborate with George Balanchine, received three honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degrees and was inducted into the Entertainment Hall of Fame for her work in television, film and on Broadway.

Born in Glen Ellyn, IL, Dunham was the blend of interracial marriage. Her interest in the arts grew during her adolescence, and Dunham studied under Russian dancer Ludmilla Speranzeva, one of the first dance teachers to accept black students. A piece of her writing was published in the August 1921 of The Brownies Book when she was 12 years old. Dunham was exposed to a variety of disciplines and was determined to pursue anthropology during a lecture by Robert Redfield. She received a grant to research indigenous West Indian dance (she called it a life-altering experience), visiting the islands of Trinidad, Jamaica, Martinique and Haiti.

She married her set and costume designer, Canadian born John Pratt, and exclusively wore his designs both on stage and in film. Her stunning features and curvaceous physique translated well, attracting Hollywood. She would appear in a total of nine motion pictures including, CARNIVAL OF RHYTHM (‘41), STAR SPANGLED RHYTHM (‘42), STORMY WEATHER (‘43) and CASBAH (‘48).

In 1941, Warner Bros. produced CARNIVAL OF RHYTHM, a short film devoted entirely to Dunham and her dance company. Along with her partner Archie Savage, she performed a ritualistic, mating dance. As tribal drums decrescendo, there is little mistaking the intention being conveyed. At a time where black performers were relegated to stereotypical subservient roles that would be constructed through the perspective of a white lens, Dunham remained unapologetic in the provocative translation of her art. CARNIVAL OF RHYTHM received favorable reviews, including an accolade from the Los Angeles Times, which wrote that the film was, “Widely acclaimed as perhaps the best short film of its type ever produced.”

Dunham’s first full-length film was an uncredited role in STAR SPANGLED RHYTHM, starring a cavalcade of Paramount stars, including Veronica Lake, Bob Hope and Bing Crosby. Dunahm performed in a minor role alongside Eddie ‘Rochester’ Anderson in the musical number “Sharp as a Tack.” Dunham maintained control over her choreography with light and exacting movement, and although she does not perform in her signature Afro-Caribbean mannerism, she does make a strong reference to the religion of Rastafarianism, which originated in Jamaica, when she speaks her only line to Anderson: “You ain’t only classy, you’re Haile Selassie”

According to the Lena Horne biography Stormy Weather, the all-black cast film, STORMY WEATHER was an amalgamation of effort on the part of the NAACP for Hollywood to present a more accurate representation of African Americans, as opposed to the stereotypical norms. Horne is the female lead. Her prior film was the Vincente Minnelli directed MGM picture CABIN IN THE SKY (‘43), in which Horne portrays the sultry role of “Sweet” Georgia Brown. Initially a stage play, Dunham originated the theatrical version role and was said to be so disappointed with losing the movie role that she was not able to bring herself to watch the film.

STORMY WEATHER is more than likely what Dunham’s Hollywood career is most associated with. In the film, Dunham and her company perform a dreamlike, softly sensual, lyrical ballet. Dunham not only choreographed her own performances, additionally, she lent her expertise to multiple Hollywood films including, CASBAH, in which Eartha Kitt made her debut as part of Dunham’s troupe; SPRING IN THE HEART (‘56); John Huston’s THE BIBLE: IN THE BEGINNING… (‘66); and a handful of uncredited pieces.