Don't miss out on this very special workshop! The instructor has obtained special permission from the National Resource Centre for Dance to use the images of Laban's real drawings for this online workshop.

Course Description

Around 1913 a young painter named Rudolf Laban gave up visual art to pursue a career in dance; yet, the Laban Archive in England holds hundreds of drawings dating from the last two decades of Laban’s life (1939-1958). These drawings indicate that while he gave up art as a profession, Laban never gave it up as a practice. Instead he drew on theories and skills gleaned from his first career and applied them to the study of dance and movement.

This three-part course illuminates how Laban used his artistic background to generate theoretical models of human movement.

The first session examines traditions and innovations in the visual depiction of human movement familiar to Laban during his immersion in the turn-of-the-century European art worlds of Paris and Munich. Traditions include proportional theory and figure drawing techniques that Laban would have learned during his studies at the Beaux Arts academy in Paris. Innovations include the impact of instantaneous photography on painting and sculpture, as well as theories and practices of Art Nouveau.

The second session illustrates how Laban drew on these sources to create Choreutic patterns, while the third session extends this discussion to incorporate Eukinetic patterns. These discussions will show that a consistent method of generation underlies these space and effort patterns, one that reveals Laban’s deep interest in symmetry, balance, and order as organizing principles of human movement.

The space and effort patterns Laban created have been conveyed to subsequent generations as “given wisdoms.” They have both prescriptive and descriptive uses. Prescriptively, they are taught as beneficial physical practices. Descriptively, they are used as prototypes or models of naturally occurring movement sequences. Both uses could and should be interrogated more deeply.

By presenting how Laban used his hand and his head to create movement patterns, I hope to encourage further discussion, exploration, and extension of our understanding of both the possibilities and the limits of human movement.

Instructor's Bio

Carol-Lynne Moore, Ph.D., C.M.A., and Registered Movement Pattern Analyst, has been involved in the field of movement study as a writer, lecturer, and consultant for four decades. A master teacher of Laban Movement Analysis, she has a deep practical and theoretical understanding of Laban’s work. She has taught in over 25 Certification Programs in the U.S. and Europe and currently directs MoveScape Center in Denver, CO. Her recent publications include Meaning in Motion (MoveScape Center, 2014), Beyond Words, 2nd ed.(Routledge, 2012), and The Harmonic Structure of Movement, Music, and Dance According to Rudolf Laban (Mellen, 2009). In 2018 she was honored to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award from LIMS. This course draws upon Dr. Moore’s doctoral and post-doctoral research in the Rudolf Laban Archive, National Resource Centre for Dance, University of Surrey, U.K.

Class Dates/Times

• October 16, 23, & 30
• 11:00 am-12:30 pm Eastern Time, US

This workshop will be recorded. If you are unable to make a live session, no worries, you will receive a link for the recorded class to view.

Who Can Join

Professionally certified individuals and those not yet certified, but who have a lot of experience can join.

Cost

$90

If you have any issues or questions, please contact our LIMS Education Associate, Rommie, at rommiestalnaker@labaninstitute.org.