Thursday, December 3, 2009

Kurt Jooss: The Dancer and Choreographer

Kurt Jooss was born in Germany in 1901. Jooss began his dance training with Rudolf Laban in 1920 and quickly came to embody Laban's techniques. After training with Laban, Jooss was introduced to Sigurd Leeder, who was also trained in Laban Movement and was trained in Labanotation. Jooss trained with Leeder and eventually began collaborating and producing works together for Jooss’ company.





Rudolf Laban


Jooss was mostly influenced by Rudolf Laban’s technique. It was this influence that shaped his dancing and choreographic skills. With this being said, Jooss’ works tended to stray away from Laban’s ideas, seeing as that movement technique was where Jooss had the most experience. Jooss tended to work with “social identity” in movement instead of the expressionism of Laban’s Movement Technique.


Laban shown with an example of Labanotation


Jooss-Leeder Ballet Company or "Ballet Jooss"

1 comment:

  1. I didn't realize that Labon actually had "Labonotation." It's fascinating to see him in the picture with his notation. Also, it's interesting how Jooss was so influenced with Laban, yet still focuses on using "social identity" in his work.

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