Dance
rhythm and art
Rationale
Dance is one of instinctive creativities in human nature as well as Art. Dance is a performance art form consisting of purposefully selected sequences of human movement. This movement has aesthetic and symbolic value, and is acknowledged as dance by performers and observers within a particular culture.
Dance can be categorized and described by its choreography, by its repertoire of movements, or by its historical period or place of origin. An important distinction is to be drawn between thecontexts of theatrical and participatory dance, although these two categories are not always completely separate; both may have special functions, whether social, ceremonial,competitive, erotic, martial, or sacred/liturgical. Others disciplines of human movement are sometimes said to have a dance-like quality, including martial arts, gymnastics, figure skating, synchronized swimming and many other forms of athletics.
athletics.http://www.artsalive.ca/en/dan/dance101/forms.asp
Human has been performed dancing and singing for various purposes in different cultures and times; sometimes people danced for a wish, sometimes for celebration or consolation. Also it has been a symbol of freedom in some contexts. Its existence has been proved through a form of art made since pre-historic time; i.e. mural in India, dancing masks in Africa and Angkor Apsaras in Cambodia, etc.
Ballerina in Blue, 1912
Gino Severini
Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2
1912
Marcel Duchamp
Angkor Apsaras in Cambodia
Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash, 1912
Giacomo Balla
In Renaissance time, we can find dancing images through a representation of myth. As rhythm does not have a visible form, it is interesting to note that mostly the image of dancer was used in order to represent dynamic movement until the emergence of Abstract art. Futurists were so passionate about representing rhythmic movement and loved the word 'dynamic'. In Gino Severini's painting Ballerina in Blue, the dancing figure is chopped into fragments similar to Cubist's painting, in order to maximise the visual effect in movement. Marcel Duchamp's cubism painting Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 brings up the image of chronophotograph. Since Abstract art, the geometry shapes replaced the dancing figures and the way of representation became more sophisticated. Nam-jun Paik opened a door for video art using TV as a medium. His artworks still appear to be the newest when they are in contemporary galleries.
French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre once observed that the social scientist and his 'object' form a couple, each one of which is to be interpreted as a moment of history. (Sartre 1963:72, cited in Berlo,1992)
The act of dance in the artworks as a medium, students will explore diverse belief system in different society. Also interpreting dance as a metaphor, students will explore as well as various representations of rhythm and movement in principle. Through investigate visual artists who was interested or performed music, students will acquire the close relationship between music and art, along with literature.
