American choreographer Paul Taylor is a giant of a man. He was tall for a dancer back when he was a student at Julliard and a soloist with the Martha Graham Dance Company (1955 to 1962), but he has cast a giant shadow as a choreographer ever since he founded his own company in 1954. At 78, he is still going strong.
Long considered the most accessible of the 20th century’s dance masters, Taylor’s works appeal to modern dance fans, balletomanes as well ordinary people. He has created more than 125 works, traveled the world with his company and has inspired countless numbers of dancers and choreographers, including Pina Bausch, Tywla Tharp and Laura Dean.
It has been two decades since his company last visited Taiwan, but Taylor has played a vital role in the development of dance in Taiwan. Both Cloud Gate Dance Theatre (雲門舞集) founder and artistic director Lin Hwai-min (林懷民) and Lin Lee-chen (林麗珍), artistic director of the Legend Lin Dance Theatre (無垢舞蹈劇場), credit Taylor with inspiring them to pursue a career in dance. Both have said that it was seeing a Taylor company performance in Taipei that made them want to follow in his footsteps. For Lin Li-chen it was a show in the 1960s; for Lin Hwai-min, it was a 1973 production. It’s hard to imagine how different Taiwan would be today if their two companies did not exist.
The Taylor company spends a large part of the year on the road, and this year is no exception. Luckily this year they made plans to be back in Asia. They were in Bangkok last weekend and are in Hong Kong now. The eight-year-old Novel Hall Dance Series, under the direction of Lin Hwai-min, usually invites three or four solo artists or companies a year to perform at Novel Hall. This year the entire budget, and then some, was spent on bringing Taylor’s company back to Taiwan.
Audiences will be able to see the wide spectrum of Taylor’s oeuvre. His company is bringing nine dances from its repertory, organized into three different shows, ranging from several of Taylor’s signature works such as Esplanade, created in 1975, to his latest piece, Changes, which was commissioned by the San Francisco Ballet and premiered in May.
In an unusual move, the company will open its Novel Hall commitment outside of Taipei, at the Chiayi Performing Arts Center on Tuesday. Chiayi is often left off the touring schedule for dance companies, local and foreign alike, which is a shame because the arts center is a gorgeous, state-of-the-art facility that puts some of the smaller venues in Taipei to shame.
The Chiayi audience will see the same lineup as first-nighters in Taipei: Mercuric Tidings (1982), Byzantium (1984) and Esplanade (1975). Next Saturday will be Arden Court (1981), Eventide (1997) and Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rehearsal) (1981), while the day after will see Images (1977), Changes (2008) and Promethean Fire (2002).
Taylor’s works vary widely in style and content and are considered the most balletic of modern dance, perhaps because of his musicality, and many can be found in the repertoire of ballet companies worldwide — even though Taylor had oft been quoted as saying he hates ballet. He loves Baroque music but has no inhibitions about using popular songs (he set Company B to the Andrews Sisters songs of the 1940s and Changes to The Mamas and The Papas) and his pieces often show a sense of humor, if not downright whimsy that can disguise his mastery of the art form (Le Sacre du Printemps is dance rehearsal meets detective novel meets gangster movie).
He has developed a language that has expanded the body’s range of motion and requires a vigorous athleticism without ever losing an innate sense of grace. His works usually leave audiences feeling good about what they have seen and about themselves, but upon repeated examination show great depths and nuances. He is not afraid to tackle weighty subjects; Promethean Fire was his response as a long-time Manhattan resident to the tragedy and terror of the Sept. 11 attacks.
In an essay on his company’s Web site, Taylor said he makes dances because he can’t help it; it is an addiction.
“I make dances because I believe in the power of contemporary dance, its immediacy, its potency, its universality,” he wrote.
That universality has certainly been proven true, and the world is a far richer place for it.
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