Trisha Brown

Dancer, choreographer

• Born: November 25, 1936
• Place of Birth: Aberdeen, Washington
• Died: March 18, 2017
• Place of Death: San Antonio, Texas

Education: Mills College

Significance: Trisha Brown was an American dancer and choreographer known for her groundbreaking dance techniques. Together with the Judson Dance Theater, which she cofounded, Brown established the postmodern dance movement. She was known for her elaborate, technologically enhanced productions. Many of her choreographed works focused on investigating bodily movement and challenged viewers' understanding of modern dance. She earned numerous honors and awards throughout her career.

Background

Trisha Brown was born on November 25, 1936, in Aberdeen, Washington. Her mother, Dorothy, was an English teacher and her father, Martell, was a salesman. Brown attended Weatherwax High School in Aberdeen, graduating in 1954. She then enrolled at Mills College in Oakland, California, where she earned a bachelor's degree in dance in 1958. She then taught dance at Reed College in Oregon for a short time. She also studied at the American Dance Festival summer schools in 1958, 1959, and 1961, receiving training from choreographer Louis Horst.

In 1961, Brown moved to New York City. She studied with a number of other dancers and choreographers, including Anna Halprin, Robert Ellis Dunn, and John Cage. The latter two were very influential in Brown's growing preference for modern dance techniques. Brown helped found the Judson Dance Theater in 1962. She and her colleagues moved further away from classical modern dance techniques. The group was more experimental and conceptual in its productions, and viewers later referred to the emerging technique as postmodern dance. In 1970, Brown helped found the experimental dance collective known as Grand Union. She also started her own dance company, the Trisha Brown Dance Company.

One of Brown's defining methods was using no music in her choreography. She employed a number of non-traditional techniques in her dances, such as having dancers twirl sideways down poles and walking across walls. Brown's early work was often stripped bare of showiness and grandeur. Her 1970 production Man Walking Down the Side of a Building simply featured a harnessed dancer scaling the side of a structure. Other pieces produced in a similar vein included Walking on the Wall, Roof Piece, and Accumulation, all first performed in 1971. These works—referred to as her "equipment pieces"—were often designed to call attention to body dynamics, such as stability and balance. Brown often staged her productions in unconventional spaces, usually outdoors in parks or on rooftops.

Life's Work

Brown's 1978 piece Accumulation with Talking Plus Watermotor, an elaborated version of Accumulation, is said by many critics to be the official christening of the postmodern dance era. By the 1980s, Brown was beginning to use music in her productions. Her 1983 dance Set and Reset was choreographed to music scored by popular avant-garde musician Laurie Anderson. Brown also began incorporating the music of classical composers such as Johann Sebastian Bach, Franz Schubert, and Georges Bizet into her pieces. Brown became more interested in staging her works in theaters during this period. The pieces were paired with music and elaborate costumes that gave her productions a more theatrical element. This era saw Brown stage a number of acclaimed pieces, including Lateral Pass (1985), Newark(1987), Astral Convertible (1989), Foray Forêt (1990), and Astral Converted (1991).

By the 1990s, Brown had become an internationally recognized choreographer, whose works were being staged at some of the world's largest theaters, including City Center in New York and Sadler's Wells in London. Throughout the 1990s, her musical attention remained focused on classical composers. She also created a number of solo pieces for herself such as 1994's If You Couldn't See Me. She later reimagined the piece as a duet with celebrated ballet dancer and choreographer Mikhail Baryshnikov, whom she regularly collaborated with. In 1995 she staged M.O., choreographed to the music of Bach. Critics called the work Brown's masterpiece.

Brown's later career saw her collaborating with a variety of artists such as visual artist Terry Winters and composer Dave Douglas. She choreographed dances to a number of operas during this period. In 1998 she directed a piece set to the music of the opera L'Orfeo by Claudio Monteverdi. Brown found herself inspired by jazz music by the end of the decade, leading to her El Trilogy, a trio of pieces staged between 1998 and 2000.

Brown worked on several more opera-inspired pieces throughout the 2000s, including Luci Mie Traditrici (2001), Winterreise (2002), Da Gelo a Gelo (2006) and Pygmalion (2010). She also reteamed with musician Laurie Anderson in 2004 for O zlożony/O composite, presented with the Paris Opera Ballet. She continued to defy conventional dance methods with her use of technology. Her 2007 piece I love my robots featured a collaboration with Japanese artist and robotics designer Kenjiro Okazak. Her final choreographed piece, I'm going to toss my arms—if you catch them they're yours, was staged in 2011. She worked with her husband, visual artist Burt Barr, and used original music by Alvin Curran. Brown battled with vascular dementia over the next few years. She passed away on March 18, 2017, in San Antonio, Texas, at the age of eighty.

Impact

Beginning in the 1960s, Brown produced more than one hundred original dance pieces throughout her career. She earned multiple honors, including a MacArthur Foundation fellowship genius grant in 1991. She was also honored with five fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, two John Simon Guggenheim fellowships, and the National Medal of Arts. Her artistic vision continues to inspire major players of the postmodern dance world. The dance company that she founded and that bears her name continues her legacy as well, performing choreography she created before her death. It was 2023 before the dance company presented a performance that was not choreographed by its founder; that first dance was choreographed by a company alumna, Judith Sánches Ruíz.

Personal Life

Brown was married to visual artist Burt Barr, who died in November of 2016. The two had a son, Adam.

Bibliography

Acocella, Joan. "Postscript: Trisha Brown." New Yorker, 23 Mar. 2017, www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/postscript-trisha-brown. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024.

Macaulay, Alastair. "Pure Dance, Pure Finale." New York Times, 25 Jan. 2013, www.nytimes.com/2013/01/27/arts/dance/trisha-browns-long-career-and-last-dances.html?mcubz=1. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024.

Macaulay, Alastair. "Trisha Brown, Choreographer and Pillar of American Postmodern Dance, Dies at 80." New York Times,20 Mar. 2017, www.nytimes.com/2017/03/20/arts/dance/trisha-brown-dead-modern-dance-choreographer.html?mcubz=1&‗r=1. 8 Oct. 2024.

Perron, Wendy. "Judith Sánchez Ruíz on Being the First Person to Receive a Choreographic Commission from the Trisha Brown Dance Company." Dance Magazine, 1 May 2023, trishabrowncompany.org/press/. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024.

Stigler, Britt. "Noé Soulier Explores Connections to Trisha Brown with ‘In the Fall’." All Arts, 26 Mar. 2024, www.allarts.org/2024/03/noe-soulier-in-the-fall-trisha-brown-dance-company/. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024.

"Trisha Brown." Foundation for Contemporary Arts, www.foundationforcontemporaryarts.org/recipients/trisha-brown. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024.

"Trisha Brown." Trisha Brown Dance Company, trishabrowncompany.org/trisha-brown/biography/. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024.

"Trisha Brown Biography." Collezione Maramotti, www.collezionemaramotti.org/documents/20182/20664/biotrisha-eng‗ai09‗cont/9532aa89-0963-4124-813a-03d40a4b4b79. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024.