Merce Cunningham
Sign in to saveAlso known as Mercier Cunningham, Mercier Philip Cunningham, Mercier Philip "Merce" Cunningham
American dancer and choreographer (1919–2009)
Person · Open Library
- Works
- 14
Top works
- Merce Cunningham's Events
- Le danseur et la danse
- The Dancer and the Dance
- Green world
- Other animals
via Open Library + Wikidata
Listeners · Last.fm
- Listeners
- 124
- Total plays
- 603
Mercier "Merce" Philip Cunningham (April 16, 1919 – July 26, 2009) was an American dancer and choreographer who was at the forefront of the American avant-garde for more than 50 years. Throughout much of his life, Cunningham was considered one of the greatest creative forces in American dance. He is also notable for his frequent collaborations with artists of other disciplines, including musicians John Cage and David Tudor, artists Robert Rauschenberg and Bruce Nauman, designer Romeo Gigli, and
Quotes
- “If a dancer dances - which is not the same as having theories about dancing or wishing to dance or trying to dance or remembering in his body someone else's dance - but if the dancer dances, everything is there.. ..our ecstasy in dance comes from the possible gift of freedom, the exhilarating moment that this exposing of the bare energy can give us. What is meant is not license, but freedom...(1952)”
- “John Cage and I became interested in the use of chance in the 50's. I think one of the very primary things that happened then was the publication of the "I Ching," the Chinese book of changes, from which you can cast your fortune: the hexagrams.”
- “Cage took it to work in his way of making compositions then; and he used the idea of 64—the number of the hexagrams —to say that you had 64, for example, sounds; then you could cast, by chance, to find which sound first appeared, cast again, to say which sound came second, cast again, so that it's done by, in that sense, chance operations. Instead of finding out what you think should follow—say a particular sound—what did the I Ching suggest? Well, I took this also for dance.”
- “I was working on a title called, “Untitled Solo,” and I had made—using the chance operations—a series of movements written on scraps of paper for the legs and the arms, the head, all different. And it was done not to the music but with the music of Christian Wolff.”
via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA
Key facts
- Born
- Mercier Philip Cunningham , ( 1919-04-16 ) April 16, 1919, Centralia, Washington , U.S.
- Died
- July 26, 2009 (2009-07-26) (aged 90), New York City, U.S.
- Occupations
- Dancer choreographer
- Years active
- 1938–2009
- Partner
- John Cage
- Website
- mercecunningham.org
via Wikipedia infobox
Official website
Home - Merce Cunningham Trust
mercecunningham.org →Link to the official site · 9,766 chars · not written by Vinony
Wikidata facts
- Official website
- www.mercecunningham.org
- Image
- Merce Cunningham April 16, 1919- July 26, 2009.png
Show 7 more facts
- name in native language
- Merce Cunningham
- date of birth
- 1919-04-16
- date of death
- 2009-07-26
- Commons category
- Merce Cunningham
- start of work period
- 1938-00-00
- birth name
- Mercier Philip Cunningham
- P12674
- Paul Uhlenhuth
Sources (10)
via Wikidata · CC0
~18 min read
Article
Merce Cunningham
Merce Philip Cunningham (April 16, 1919 – July 26, 2009) was an American dancer and choreographer who was at the forefront of American modern dance for more than 50 years. He frequently collaborated with artists of other disciplines, including musicians John Cage, David Tudor, Brian Eno, and graphic artists Robert Rauschenberg, Bruce Nauman, Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Frank Stella, and Jasper Johns; and fashion designer Rei Kawakubo. Works that he produced with these artists had a profound impact on avant-garde art beyond the world of dance.