The Art of Modern Dance

In its infancy, modern dance was grown by great dancers, choreographers, and teachers such as Isadora Duncan, Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn, Lester Horton, Martha Graham, and Merce Cunningham.

Along came other great innovators like Alvin Ailey, Twyla Tharp and Pilobolus. More continue to grow.

Modern dance, like modern painting or music, moved experimentally from classical to more contemporary modes.

The early modern dance looks derived ranged from Greek chorus-like to the Vogue quality costuming in motion of Martha Graham. While modern dance great Alvin Ailey choreographed modern motion, he told historical stories like his famed "Revelation."

Titles of dance performance moved from Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake, grand opera style, to concept words, ideas, themes, simple nouns verbs, and poetry. Technique varied from the turned out, rounded, highly regimented ballet to parallel, straight positions and configurations.

Yet often balletic movements found their way into modern dance, as if modern were an extension of dance as opposed to representing a formal break with classical methods.

Let's take a journey into modern dance demonstrating these developments by examining photos and videos, and exploring modern dance development over time. The bridge to hip hop is a natural progression in contemporary dance artists.