Martha Graham Dance Company

100 years ago, the dance world was forever altered by Martha Graham’s vision, which expanded contemporary dance’s vocabulary of movement and forever altered the scope of the art form by rooting works in contemporary social, political, psychological, and sexual contexts. This vision has been and continues to be a source of inspiration for generations of dance artists; experiencing it live will change the way you see the world.

Now the legendary Martha Graham Dance Company continues its three-year GRAHAM100 tour with a celebratory mixed repertory stop at The Purchase PAC. Exemplifying its founder’s timeless and uniquely American style of dance, the third season of GRAHAM100, aligned with the national celebration America250, is titled The Masterpieces. Curated around the question “What is an American?” from Graham’s 1939 work American Document, the season focuses on Graham’s greatest works.

Program:

Chronicle (1936)
Chronicle premiered at the Guild Theater in New York City on December 20, 1936; the dance was a response to the rising menace of fascism in Europe. Chronicle does not attempt to show the actualities of war; rather does it, by evoking war’s images, set forth the fateful prelude to war, portray the devastation of spirit which it leaves in its wake, and suggest an answer.

Cortege (2024)
Drawing inspiration from Martha Graham’s Cortege of Eagles, Choreographers Baye & Asa focus on Charon, the ferryman who shepherds souls to the underworld. In Graham’s work, the Trojan Empire is crumbling, and Charon is the conductor of its inevitable fall.  Baye & Asa’s Cortege removes this central figure of mythological predestination, and instead places the burden of fate on the ensemble.

Night Journey (1947)
In Night Journey, Graham’s retelling of the Oedipus myth, it is not Oedipus but Queen Jocasta who is the protagonist. The action of the dance turns upon that instant of her death when she relives her destiny and sees with double insight the triumphal entry of Oedipus, their meeting, courtship, marriage, their years of intimacy which were darkly crossed by the blind seer Tiresias until at last the truth burst from him. The chorus of women, who know the truth before the seer speaks it, tries in vain to divert the prophecy’s cruel conclusion.

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About the Artist

Martha Graham (1894–1991) is recognized as a primal artistic force of the 20th century, alongside Picasso, James Joyce, Stravinsky, and Frank Lloyd Wright, single-handedly defining contemporary dance as a uniquely American art form. In developing her technique, Martha Graham experimented endlessly with basic human movement, beginning with the most elemental movements of contraction and release. Using these principles as the foundation for her technique, she built a vocabulary of movement that would “increase the emotional activity of the dancer’s body.”

Learn more about Martha Graham and the Martha Graham Dance Company on their website.