Abstract
Contemporary dance is a highly ephemeral art form operating on the margins of Irish arts where its history remains to a large extent undocumented and its status fragile. Contemporary dance is also particularly reliant on Arts Council resources and therefore funding decisions by that body to reduce and, in some instances, withdraw funding from established dance companies in the late 1980s had significant impact. This chapter contextualizes practices and productions of select Irish-based choreographers who established independent dance companies in the early 1990s. Interviews with the choreographers are testament to the role that dance training played in forging their dance aesthetic, and, as this group of choreographers studied with important dance artists abroad, a picture emerges of an Irish-based dance practice of embodied internationalism. Mid-decade, a new Arts Plan put forward policy on dance that was perceived to evince a distinct and quintessential ‘Irish’ flavour. Randy Martin’s concept of ‘mobilization’ (which he borrows from Marx) provides a framework for consideration of choreographers’ artistic choices as resisting perceived pressure set out by the status quo. In determining their individual artistic autonomies, choreographers anticipated the trend towards globalization that would engulf Ireland at the decade’s end. These choreographers were instrumental in embedding a range of international dance practices in Ireland. An increased diversity of style and aesthetic followed which included an embrace of interdisciplinary creative processes. Thus, their work responded to creative ideas of their international counterparts signalling the expansion of the parameters of the art form in Ireland.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
- 1.
The choreographers are selected for a number of reasons. Firstly, they were chosen in the early 1990s for funding by the Arts Council. Secondly, a number of significant choreographers who were to emerge later in the decade danced with the five selected for interview. For example: David Bolger who established CoisCéim Dance Theatre in 1992, worked with Fiona Quilligan on a number of occasions and was an original cast member in Bull Dance which is referenced here. Liz Roche worked with DTI (and CoisCéim) and formed Rex Levitates in 1999. Fearghus O’Conchuir and Ríonach Ní Néill worked with Adrienne Brown and emerged as exciting artists at the end of the decade. This is not to suggest that Bolger, Roche, Ní Néill, and O’Conchuir danced exclusively with the choreographers I interviewed (in fact all mentioned had significant experience of training and practice abroad), or that these dancers necessarily practiced the style or choreographic vocabulary of those I foreground, but this chapter does not allow space to include all choreographers of the period. A further very significant choreographer is Michael Keegan-Dolan who has enjoyed considerable success in Ireland and abroad. See Aoife McGrath’s Dance Theatre in Ireland: Revolutionary Moves (Palgrave, 2013), for an excellent account of Keegan-Dolan and David Bolger’s work, and for a scholarly appraisal of selected Irish dance history and aesthetics. For note, discussion of two important choreographers of the period, Mary Nunan who founded Daghdha Dance Company, and Cathy O’Kennedy (formally Hayes), was beyond the scope of this chapter. Hence I acknowledge the chapter’s Dublin-centric focus, as both Daghdha Dance Company and Barefoot Dance Company were located in Limerick and Wexford respectively. Another important choreographer is the American-born dance artist Cindy Cummings who has been based in Ireland since 1990 and whose career has focused particularly on trans-disciplinary collaboration.
- 2.
I encountered a lack of consensus from among the five choreographers interviewed with regard to their description of their work. Connor and Yurick refer to their work as dance theatre and Quilligan refers to her work as modern ballet, while Scott and Brown use the terms dance theatre, dance and/or contemporary dance interchangeably. For note, dance terminology forms an ongoing debate in dance studies and for further reading see: Sally Banes, Terpsichore in Sneakers: Modern and Post-Modern Dance, Middletown (CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1977, 1989).
- 3.
Peter Brinson, The Dancer and the Dance: Developing Theatre Dance in Ireland (Dublin: The Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon, 1985), 15.
- 4.
Randy Martin, Critical Moves: Dance Studies in Theory and Politics (Durham and London: Duke University Press 1998), 10.
- 5.
Jane C. Desmond, “Introduction” in Meaning in Motion: New Cultural Studies in Dance ed. Jane C. Desmond (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1997), 1.
- 6.
Martin, Critical Moves: Dance Studies in Theory and Politics, 204.
- 7.
Ibid., 203–204.
- 8.
Ibid.
- 9.
Ibid., 205.
- 10.
Ramsay Burt, “Genealogy and Dance History: Foucault, Rainer, Bausch and de Keersmaeker” in Of The Presence Of The Body: Essays on Dance and Performance Theory, ed. André Lepecki (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2004), 30.
- 11.
Michel Foucault, “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” in Language Counter-Memory, Practice: Selected Essays and Interviews (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1977), 148.
- 12.
Burt, “Genealogy and Dance History: Foucault, Rainer, Bausch and de Keersmaeker”, 34.
- 13.
Martin, Critical Moves: Dance Studies in Theory and Politics, 175.
- 14.
Ibid., 156.
- 15.
Patricia Quinn, Arts Council director, speaking in 1998 at a Public Consultation Forum for the development of the New Arts Plan, Malahide, Co. Dublin.
- 16.
The Arts Plan: 1995–1997 (Dublin: 1994), 43.
- 17.
John Scott in Dancing on the Edge of Europe: Irish Choreographers in Conversation, ed. Diana Theodores (Cork: Institute of Choreography and Dance ICD, 2003), 220.
- 18.
Dance News Ireland: The Newsletter of the Dance Council of Ireland, Vol. 5 No. 1, 1989, 1.
- 19.
Brinson, Peter, The Dancer and the Dance: Developing Theatre Dance in Ireland (Dublin: The Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon, 1985), 21.
- 20.
Brinson’s recommendations are given separately for each company. The report was particularly favourable to DCDT and recommended that resources be given to employ an administrator and one further dancer, and that the company be included in any plans to develop a National Dance School (34). The achievements of DCB were duly recorded but it was noted that within the context “of limited Government funding there seems to be no way that funds can be argued for to support a company of this size and programme” (30). Brinson recommended a root and branch overhaul of INB’s governance and company structures but argued: “there is no question an Irish National ballet should exist. Present problems are not insoluble” (27). This chapter cannot do justice to the breath of commentary, analysis and recommendations articulated by Brinson. Under “National Considerations” Brinson turns his attention to Government funding for the Arts in Ireland and urges that: “the Irish Government should as a matter of urgency and equity, reconsider its attitude to the arts […] and increase immediately its annual subvention to the Arts Council with consequential benefit to dance” (15). And one can speculate whether section 1.1.2., on the same page, was carefully considered by the Arts Council with regard to its decision to withdraw funds to dance in 1989: “Since no short term solution to underfunding seems in sight […] we are compelled in this report to access what sacrifices will be necessary to achieve the objective of a balanced theatre dance profession able to contribute with increasing vigour to cultural life in Ireland” ibid.
- 21.
Dublin City Ballet ceased to operate in 1986 due to decreased financial support from the Arts Council.
- 22.
The first of three options for the Arts Council as articulated by Brinson was: “Accept that present funds available to the Arts Council are insufficient to allow support for dance in any meaningful way.” Brinson discounted this option however arguing: “we do not believe […] that nothing can be done for dance with £375,000” 21.
- 23.
Michael Seaver, “No Dancing”, The Irish Times, 5 August 1998, 9.
- 24.
Ibid.
- 25.
To illustrate Seaver’s points on the Arts Council’s changing policy in the 1990s, I quote this paragraph, which prefaces the section on Dance in its Annual Report: “1997 saw the final phase of a three-year funding cycle, which was set up in 1994 as one of the development strategies for theatre dance. Three dance companies (Rubato Ballet, Irish Modern Dance Theatre and Dance Theatre of Ireland) had been in receipt of guaranteed funding for the years 1994, 1995 and 1996. In the course of the Arts Plan, two other revenue-funded companies (New Balance and CoisCéim), were seen as part of the revenue-support framework for theatre dance. The Council made the decision to carry three of these five companies (Dance Theatre of Ireland, Irish Modern Dance Theatre and CoisCéim) forward on a revenue basis into 1997” Annual Report 1997, Dublin: The Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon, 1997 22.
- 26.
The Arts Council of Ireland/An Chomhairle Ealaíon, The Arts Plan: 1995–1997, 44.
- 27.
Michael Seaver, “No Dancing”, The Irish Times, 5 August 1998.
- 28.
Michael Seaver “Afterword-Edging Towards Centre Stage: Living Dance History in Contemporary Ireland” in Theodores, Dancing on the Edge of Europe: Irish Choreographers in Conversation, 233.
- 29.
Seaver, “No Dancing.”
- 30.
For note, Rubato Ballet had already been removed from the cohort of companies (see note 25 above). This decision was indicative of inconsistent Arts Council funding policies. For reaction among dance artists, see Paul Johnston “Dancing in the Dark” in Irish Theatre Magazine May 2000, and Finola Cronin “The Time has Come to Dance: The International Dance Festival of Ireland 2002” in Finola Cronin and Eamonn Jordan eds. The Contemporary Irish Theatre and Performance Studies Reader, 2016.
- 31.
Dance was marginalised at the very core of the Arts Council in so far as it was not a named art form until the Arts Act of 2003. Hence, it was not until 2006 that choreographers were deemed eligible for election to Aosdána. At the time of writing, three choreographers are members of that body but are not entitled to artists’ tax exemption in contrast to other artist members.
- 32.
Brinson notes the “absence of any member with dance knowledge within the Council itself” (18). The Arts Council’s Annual Reports in 1988 and 1989 record the drop in the Dance budget from IR£417,114 to IR£214,607 in the period 1988–1989. In the same period, funding for Film rose from IR£125,000 to IR£211,600.
- 33.
Brown studied on the London School of Contemporary Dance Evening School programme led by American dance teacher Karen Bell-Kanner. On her return to Dublin, Brown continued to attend Summer Schools at the Graham centre in New York City throughout the 1990s and was awarded a teacher certificate in 1996.
- 34.
The quotes in this section are from Brown and emanate from a live interview on 28 February, 2017 and one recorded interview on 3 March 2017 with the author.
- 35.
London Contemporary Dance School, which also housed the London Contemporary Dance Theatre (the professional company), is located on Flaxman Terrace off the Euston Road, London, and was also known as The Place.
- 36.
Philanthropist Robin Howard saw the Martha Graham Dance Company in performance in London in 1954 and financed the company’s tour to Edinburgh Festival in 1963. He was determined to bring her teaching method and dance style to London. Graham agreed to have the school formally associated with her work and sent one of her leading dancers, Robert Cohen, to guide the project. Among the dance artists who taught at The Place were Jane Dudley, a member of the Graham Company from the 1930s and a significant choreographer in her own right, Juliet Fisher, Bill Louther, Nina Fonaroff and the Argentinean dancer Naomi Lapzeson. All of these artists were instrumental in establishing The Place’s reputation as among the most exciting dance schools in Europe in the late twentieth century whose alumni includes leading choreographers and filmmakers Siobhan Davis, Richard Alston, Kim Brandstrup and Sally Potter, among many others.
- 37.
Brown, in conversation.
- 38.
Ibid.
- 39.
Seminal works of Graham based on interpretation of Greek myth include: Cave of the Heart (1946), Night Journey (1947) and Errand into the Maze (1947). Mark Franko records the dramaturgy of these works as exemplars of Graham’s approach to “universalizing narrative and its mythical symbolism” and notes that that Graham’s aim was to encourage the spectator to “project their own life experience into [the] choreography.” Mark Franko, Martha Graham in Love and War: The Life in the Work, 2012, 6.
- 40.
Brown, in conversation.
- 41.
Brown, interview.
- 42.
Dance artists in Ireland have long been aware of the need to nurture their craft, and are all too aware of the resources required to do so. The first “National Choreographic Course” took place in Wexford in 1985. Organized by Cathy Hayes (O’Kennedy) it afforded dance artists the live bodies and appropriate rehearsal spaces in which to create and research their work.
- 43.
Brady commissioned this writer to document the research process of Adrienne Brown’s Righting Dance programme. The research process included curated events where the material created was shared with invited audiences. A second Righting Dance programme was initiated in January 1999 with choreographers Mary Nunan and Paul Johnson under the mentorship of Canadian choreographer Tedd Senmon-Robinson. The accompanying publication/documentation sets out the aims of ICD’s Righting Dance programme: “To engineer circumstances that test and try current practice, helping to invigorate stronger work and proposals for fresh approaches in making dance.” Mary Brady in Theodores, Writing Dancing Righting Dance, 5.
- 44.
Finola Cronin, Righting Dance: ‘Time Out’ Choreographer: Adrienne Brown, December 1997–April 1999 (Cork: Institute of Choreography and Dance (ICD), 2000), 6.
- 45.
Brown, in interview.
- 46.
Adrienne Brown, letter to Mary Brady, of the Arts Council sub-committee on Dance, dated 10 February 1994. The Adrienne Brown Papers. Accessed 6 July 2016.
- 47.
Ibid.
- 48.
Brown in Dancing on the Edge of Europe: Irish Choreographers in Conversation, 62.
- 49.
Fiona Quilligan, written correspondence with FC. Quotations from Fiona Quilligan are from written correspondence and one interview conducted on 1 March 2017.
- 50.
Ibid.
- 51.
The Place’s Head of Technique was Jane Dudley, but classes in composition and choreography were also core. Nina Fonaroff was head of the Department of Choreography and, as Stephanie Jordan points out, she espoused a training method “devised by Louis Horst, Graham’s long-time musical director.” In Striding Out: Aspects of Contemporary and New Dance in Britain, 1992 (15).
- 52.
American dancer and choreographer Anne Courtney was invited to Dublin to act as artistic director of Dublin City Ballet and lead its dance in education brief. Dublin City Ballet was first established in 1979 by entrepreneur Louis O’Sullivan under the name of The Oscar Ballet Company with Ian Montague appointed as artistic director.
- 53.
Anna Kisselgoff, “Review/Dance; Anna Sokolow: Takes a Bow for 50 Years”, New York Times, 20 January 1991. For note, Sokolov is also written Sokolow. I have used Sokolov except when inserting quotations from other writers.
- 54.
Quilligan, written correspondence.
- 55.
Ibid.
- 56.
Quilligan, interview.
- 57.
Ibid.
- 58.
Quilligan, correspondence.
- 59.
Ibid.
- 60.
The Jazz Quartet of Patrick Carayannis included Mike Nielsen, Ray McCann and Dave Flemming.
- 61.
Mic Moroney, ‘Rubato in Rehearsal’, in In Dublin, 11–24 October 1990, 117.
- 62.
Quilligan, correspondence.
- 63.
Ibid.
- 64.
John Scott written correspondence with FC February 2017. The author conducted one interview with Scott and written correspondence on 20 February 2017. Sokolov created two new works for Dublin City Ballet: Homage to John Field which had its premiere in The Place, London, in June 1985, and Transfigured Nights which premiered at the Peacock Theatre Dublin in July 1985.
- 65.
Ellen Graff, quoted in Mark Franko’s The Work of Dance: Labor, Movement, and Identity in the 1930s, 2002, 57.
- 66.
Scott, written correspondence.
- 67.
Ibid.
- 68.
Scott, interview.
- 69.
Scott, written correspondence.
- 70.
Ibid.
- 71.
Carolyn Swift, “Emotion in Motion: Macalla RHA Gallagher Gallery”, The Irish Times, 11 January 1995, 12.
- 72.
The establishment of a number of Centres Chorégraphic Nationale (National Choreographic Centres) throughout France in the late 1970s, and spearheaded by culture minister Jack Lang in the 1980s, was instrumental in creating a boom in dance practice in France. So-called ‘New French Dance’ built on American modern and post-modern dance as brought to France by among others Alwin Nikolais (a protégée of Hanya Holm, and from 1978 director of the Centre Chorégraphic at Angers) and Carolyn Carlson (a dancer with Nikolais and later choreographer for the Paris Opera Ballet among other companies). New French Dance’s leading figures included: Jean-Claude Galotta director of Group Emile Dubois, who studied in New York with Merce Cunningham from 1976–1978, Régine Chopinot, Joelle Bovier and Régis Obadia to name but a few. In 1988, Group Emile Dubois presented Docteur Labus by Galotta at the Olympia Theatre as part of the Dublin Theatre Festival.
- 73.
Carolyn Swift, “Dancers in Search of a choreographer: Irish Modern Dance Theatre Project Arts Centre”, The Irish Times, 7 June 1995, 10.
- 74.
Mark Franko, The Work of Dance: Labor, Movement, and Identity in the 1930s (Middletown CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2002), 57.
- 75.
Robert Connor and Loretta Yurick in conversation with FC 6 March 2017. Quotations from Connor and Yurick emanate also from written correspondence with the author, 25 February 2017.
- 76.
The ‘Big Four’ included: Holm, Martha Graham, Doris Humphreys and Charles Wideman and had enormous influence in the 1930s–1950s. Particularly noteworthy was the popularizing of modern dance through the Bennington School of Dance summer programme, established in 1934 at Benningtom College, Vermont, which operated as an incubation laboratory for emerging dancers and choreographers.
- 77.
Davis had invited Sara and Jerry Peason to work with DCDT in the 1980s and commissioned among other works Acid Rain (1982) and Lunar Parables (1984).
- 78.
Connor, written correspondence.
- 79.
Douissant and Dubuloz won the prestigious Prix de Bagnolnet choreographic competition in 1988 and La Beauté was subsequently premiered in France (with a different cast) at Theatre de la Ville, Paris in 1991.
- 80.
Dominique Bagouet (1951–1992) was a towering figure at the heart of so-called ‘New French Dance’ in the 1980s. A further collaboration followed in 1997 when Les Carnets Bagouet co-produced and restaged Jours Etranges with DTI.
- 81.
Connor, written correspondence.
- 82.
Yurick, written correspondence.
- 83.
Connor, written correspondence.
- 84.
Ibid.
- 85.
Ibid.
- 86.
Ibid.
- 87.
Seona Mac Réamoinn, “Soul Survivor”, The Sunday Tribune 18 July 1999. Dance Theatre of Ireland Collected Papers. Accessed 27 July 2016.
- 88.
Yurick, written correspondence.
- 89.
Connor, written correspondence.
Bibliography
Banes, Sally. Terpsichore in Sneakers: Modern and Post-Modern Dance. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1977, 1989.
Brinson, Peter. The Dancer and the Dance: Developing Theatre Dance in Ireland. Dublin: The Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon, 1985.
Cronin, Finola, and Eamonn Jordan. eds., The Contemporary Irish Theatre and Performance Studies Reader. Dublin: Carsyfort Press, 2016.
Cronin, Finola Righting Dance: ‘Time Out’ Choreographer: Adrienne Brown December 1997–April 1999. Cork: Institute of Choreography and Dance (ICD), 2000. (Unpublished).
Dance News Ireland: The Newsletter of the Dance Council of Ireland, Vol. 5 No. 1, 1989 (Winter).
Desmond, Jane C., ed. Meaning in Motion: New Cultural Studies in Dance. Durham & London: Duke University Press, 1997.
Franko, Mark. The Work of Dance: Labor, Movement, and Identity in the 1930s. Middletown CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2002.
Franko, Mark. Martha Graham in Love and War: The Life in the Work. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.
Foucault, Michel. Language Counter-Memory, Practice: Selected Essays and Interviews edited with an Introduction by Donald F. Bouchard, translated by Donald F. Bouchard and Sherry Simon, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1977.
Johnston, Paul. “Dancing in the Dark.” Irish Theatre Magazine, May, 2000.
Jordan, Stephanie. Striding Out: Aspects of Contemporary and New Dance in Britain. London: Dance Books, 1992.
Kisselgoff, Anna. “Review/Dance; Anna Sokolow: Takes a Bow for 50 Years.” New York Times, January 20, 1991.
Lepecki, André, ed. Of The Presence Of The Body: Essays on Dance and Performance Theory. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2004.
Martin, Randy. Critical Moves: Dance Studies in Theory and Politics. Durham & London: Duke University Press, 1998.
McGrath, Aoife. Dance Theatre in Ireland: Revolutionary Moves. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013.
Mac Réamoinn, Seona. Review, Sunday Tribune, November 6, 2000.
Moroney, Mic. “Rubato in Rehearsal.” In Dublin, October 11–24, 1990.
Seaver, Michael. “No Dancing.” The Irish Times, August 5, 1998.
Swift, Caroline. “Emotion in Motion: Macalla RHA Gallagher Gallery.” The Irish Times, January 11, 1995.
Swift, Caroline. “Dancers in Search of a Choreographer: Irish Modern Dance Theatre Project Arts Centre.” The Irish Times, June 7, 1995.
Theodores, Diana. Writing Dancing Righting Dance. Cork: Institute of Choreography and Dance ICD, 2000.
Theodores, Diane, ed. Dancing on the Edge of Europe: Irish Choreographers in Conversation. Cork: Institute of Choreography and Dance (ICD), 2003.
The Arts Council of Ireland/An Chomhairle Ealaíon, The Arts Plan: 1995–1997, Dublin: 1994.
The Arts Council of Ireland/An Chomhairle Ealaíon. Annual Report, 1988, Dublin: 1989.
The Arts Council of Ireland/An Chomhairle Ealaíon. Annual Report, 1989, Dublin: 1990.
The Arts Council of Ireland/An Chomhairle Ealaíon. Annual Report, 1997, Dublin: 1998.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Cronin, F. (2018). Gestures of Resistance: Dance in 1990s Ireland. In: Jordan, E., Weitz, E. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Contemporary Irish Theatre and Performance. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58588-2_8
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58588-2_8
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-58587-5
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-58588-2
eBook Packages: Literature, Cultural and Media StudiesLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)