Lillian Elaine Summers (February 20, 1925 – December 27, 2014) was an American

choreographer Choreography is the art or practice of designing sequences of movements of physical bodies (or their depictions) in which motion or form or both are specified. ''Choreography'' may also refer to the design itself. A choreographer is one who cr ...

, experimental filmmaker, and intermedia pioneer. She was a founding member of the original workshop-group that would form the Judson Dance Theater and she significantly contributed to the interaction of

film A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...

and

dance Dance is a performing art form consisting of sequences of movement, either improvised or purposefully selected. This movement has aesthetic and often symbolic value. Dance can be categorized and described by its choreography, by its repertoir ...

, as well as the expansion of dance into other related disciplines, such as visual art,

, and theater. She fostered the expansion of performing dance in new, often outdoor locations. Her movement approach Kinetic Awareness offers a comprehensive perspective on human movement and dance. She died at Bellevue Hospital, New York, on the morning of December 27, 2014, after a fall at her home.

Early life

Elaine Summers was born in Perth, Western Australia and grew up in Boston, Massachusetts with her mother and her younger brother John. Although she took self-paid dance classes through adolescence, she first studied Art Education and received a Bachelor of Science degree from the Massachusetts College of Art in 1947.

Moving to New York / Judson Dance Theater

In 1951 Elaine Summers came to New York and attended classes at the Juilliard School of Dance, together with Paul Taylor and Carolyn Brown. She also studied with Louis Horst, Merce Cunningham, Daniel Nagrin, Don Redlich, Mary Anthony, Charlotte Selver and Carola Speads, (both students of German body-reeducation pioneer Elsa Gindler), Jean Erdman,

Janet Collins Janet Collins (March 7, 1917 – May 28, 2003) was an African American ballet dancer, choreographer, and teacher. She performed on Broadway, in films, and appeared frequently on television. She was among the pioneers of black ballet dancing, one o ...

, and at the Martha Graham School. In 1962 Summers joined the composition class taught by Robert Ellis Dunn at the Merce Cunningham Studio in its second term, and subsequently became part of the workshop-group that would later be referred to as the Judson Dance Theater, together with Edward Bhartonne, Trisha Brown,

Lucinda Childs Lucinda Childs (born June 26, 1940) is an American postmodern dancer/choreographer and actress. Her compositions are known for their minimalistic movements yet complex transitions. Childs is most famous for being able to turn the slightest movem ...

, Ruth Emerson, Fred Herko, Sally Gross, Deborah Hay, David Gordon, John Herbert McDowell, Gretchen MacLane, Robert Morris,

Aileen Passloff Aileen Passloff (October 21, 1931November 3, 2020) was an American dancer and teacher who lived and worked in New York City. From 1949 to 1953, she studied at Bennington College. She attended the School of American Ballet, where she met James Wari ...

Steve Paxton Steve Paxton (born 1939 in Phoenix, Arizona) is an experimental dancer and choreographer. His early background was in gymnastics while his later training included three years with Merce Cunningham and a year with José Limón. As a founding mem ...

, Rudy Perez, Yvonne Rainer,

Robert Rauschenberg Milton Ernest "Robert" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combines (1954–1964), a group of artwor ...

, and Valda Setterfield. At Judson, Summers shared in the ongoing experiments with chance methods and pedestrian, everyday movements as part of the interest in expanding the then accepted methods of creating and performing dances. However, she also embraced the more theatrical part of the collective (as did Aileen Passloff, John Herbert McDowell and others). Summers expanded dance into other disciplines, experimental film, visual art, and body work. In the later phase of the Judson Dance Theater she created dances that would be made to work with the entire environment of the performance space, notably ''Country Houses'' (1963), which included speaking non-sequitor one-liners, and her solo-concert ''Fantastic Gardens'' (1964), which included the first large-scale use of intermedia, immersing the entire performance area in film-projections, multiplied by the audience with hand-held mirrors.Mekas, Jonas (February 27, 1964), "Movie Journal", '' Village Voice'', p. 12.

References

Sources

* Banes, Sally, ''Democracy's body''. Judson Dance Theater 1962–64. Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1983 * Green, Jill, ''The Use of Balls in Kinetic Awareness'' 1982, JOPERD, Vol. 63 No. 8 * Saltonstall, Ellen ''Kinetic Awareness: Discovering Your Bodymind'' 1988, Kinetic Awareness Center / The Publishing Center for Cultural Resources, New York City (out of print) * Körtvélyessy, Thomas, ''committed to body choice and intermedia: Elaine Summers''. paper dance history, Rotterdamse Dansacademie, 1994 * Körtvélyessy, Thomas, ''completely coming into moving: Kinetic Awareness for the contemporary dance teacher''. paper educational sciences, Rotterdamse Dansacademie, 1996 (written in Dutch) * Wooster, Anne-Sargent, ''Elaine Summers: moving to dance''. The Drama Review T86, New York NY, December 1980, pp. 59–70

External links

Elaine Summers papers, 1929-2015
Jerome Robbins Dance Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. {{DEFAULTSORT:Summers, Elaine 1925 births 2014 deaths American choreographers American women experimental filmmakers People from Perth, Western Australia