Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T19:17:21.609Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Still Moving: The Revelation or Representation of Dance in Still Photography

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 July 2014

Matthew Reason
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Arnold Genthe's 1915 photograph of Anna Pavlova, taken as she leaps into the air, is perhaps the earliest photograph of free movement in dance (Fig. 1). Unlike many other early images, with long exposure times necessitating static poses or wires to hold up the dancers, this photograph depicts actual movement. This claim to authenticity and actuality is a powerful part of its appeal; looking at the image, viewers are sure that they are witnesses to a faithful reproduction of Pavlova dancing, that they are seeing the dance of the past. Considered in this manner, the photograph is an example of the revelatory power of the camera to show us what has been.

However, Genthe's photograph is not a powerful image simply because it is, authentically, of a dancer in motion. It might have mechanically frozen its subject in time, but the photograph communicates movement beyond the moment it depicts—beyond, in a sense, what it reveals photographically to what it evokes in the mind of the viewer. Viewers are able to see movement in details indicative of motion: the flowing fabric of the costume, Pavlova's bodily posture with raised and powerfully muscled thigh, the elevated arm gestures, and the sharply bent and thrusting toes. Additionally, the degree of blur in the photograph provides an indistinctness that is suggestive of something in motion; oddly, the partial obscurity of the picture prompts viewers to imagine more than they can see. All of these elements are evocative indications of movement; they are neither documentary nor part of what can be called photographic revelation, but are instead representational.

Type
Articles
Information
Dance Research Journal , Volume 36 , Issue 1: 35/2 Winter 2003 & 36/1 Summer 2004 , Summer 2004 , pp. 43 - 67
Copyright
Copyright © Congress on Research in Dance 2004

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Works Cited

Aloff, Mindy. 2001. It's Not Ephemera After All. National Initiative to Preserve America's Dance, www.danceusa.org/NIPAD/nextsteps7.html. Accessed: September 2001.Google Scholar
Barthes, Roland. 1984. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography. Translated by Howard, Richard. London: Flamingo.Google Scholar
Bazin, André. 1967. What Is Cinema? Translated by Gray, Hugh. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Braun, Marta. 1997. “The Expanded Present: Photographing Movement.” Beauty of Another Order: Photography in Science. Edited by Thomas, Ann. New Haven, Mass: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Brooks, Bonnie. 2001a. Solutions from Within. National Initiative to Preserve America's Dance, www.danceusa.org/nextsteps2.html. Accessed: September 2001.Google Scholar
Brooks, Bonnie. 2001b. Use It or Lose It: Artists Keep Dance Alive. National Initiative for the Preservation of America's Dance. www.danceusa.org/NIPAD/nextstepsi.html. Accessed: September 2001.Google Scholar
de Marinis, Marco. 1985. “A Faithful Betrayal of Performance: Note on the Use of Video and Theatre.” New Theatre Quarterly 1 (4): 383–389.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Denby, Edwin. 1986. Dance Writings. Edited by Cornfield, Robert and MacKay, William. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.Google Scholar
Erenstein, Robert L., ed. 1988. Theatre and Television. Amsterdam: International Theatre Bookshop.Google Scholar
Ewing, William A. 1987. The Fugitive Gesture: Masterpieces of Dance Photography. London: Thames and Hudson.Google Scholar
Greenfield, Lois. 1992. Breaking Bounds: The Dance Photography of Lois Greenfield. Edited by Ewing, William A.. London: Thames and Hudson.Google Scholar
Greenfield, Lois. 1998. Airborne. London: Thames and Hudson.Google Scholar
Horgan v. Macmillan Inc. 1986. United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit. Chief Judge Feinberg. April 28. (789 F.2d 157).Google Scholar
Johnson, Catherine, and Snyder, Allegra Fuller. 1999. Securing Our Dance Heritage: Issues in the Documentation and Preservation of Dance. Washington, DC: Council on Library and Information Resources.Google Scholar
Lockyer, Bob. 2000. “A Home for Our Heritage.” Dancing Times (October): 41.Google Scholar
Marien, Mary Warner. 1997. Photography and Its Critics: A Cultural History 1839—1900. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
McAuley, Gay, ed. 1986. The Documentation and Notation of Theatrical Performance. Sydney: Sydney Association for Studies in Society and Culture.Google Scholar
McAuley, Gay. 1994. “The Video Documentation of Theatrical Performance.” New Theatre Quarterly 10 (38): 183–194.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McQuire, Scott. 1988. Visions of Modernity: Representation, Memory, Time and Space in the Age of the Camera. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Meisner, Nadine. 1998. “Dance: Twisted Theatre.” The Independent (April 27): Features 26, 2.Google Scholar
Melzer, Annabelle. 1995a. “‘Best Betrayal’: The Documentation of Performance on Film and Video, Part 1.” New Theatre Quarterly 11 (42): 147–157.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Melzer, Annabelle. 1995b. “‘Best Betrayal’: The Documentation of Performance on Video and Film, Part 2.” New Theatre Quarterly 11 (43): 259–276.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Jonathan. 1986. Subsequent Performances. London: Faber and Faber.Google Scholar
Mitchell, Jack. 1999. “Capturing Emotion in Motion.” Dance Magazine (December): 66–75.Google Scholar
Nash, Chris. 1993. A Glance at the Toes: The Dance Photography of Chris Nash. Contemporary Portfolio Series. Croydon, Surrey: Creative Monochrome.Google Scholar
Nash, Chris. 2000. Assemblage. London: Philip Mosley.Google Scholar
Nash, Chris. 2001. Stop Motion. London: Fiat Lux.Google Scholar
Padgette, Paul, ed. 1981. The Dance Photography of Carl Van Vechten. New York: Schirmer Books.Google Scholar
Potter, Michelle. 2000. “A National Archive.” Dancing Times (November): 120.Google Scholar
Rosenberg, Douglas. 2000. Screen Dance. Dziga Vertov Performance Group, http://www.dvpg.net/docs/screendance.pdf. Accessed: July 5, 2002.Google Scholar
Rosenberg, Douglas. 2002. Video Space: A Site for Choreography. Dziga Vertov Performance Group, http://www.dvpg.net/docs/videospace.pdf. Accessed: July 5, 2002.Google Scholar
Savedoff, Barbara E. 2000. Transforming Images: How Photography Complicates the Picture. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Snowdon, A. 1996. Snowdon on Stage. London: Pavilion.Google Scholar
Sontag, Susan. 1979. On Photography. New York: Penguin Books.Google Scholar
Sorell, Walter. 1981. Dance in its Time. New York: Anchor Press/Doubleday.Google Scholar
Sturgis, Alexander. 2000. Telling Time. London: National Gallery Company.Google Scholar