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Movement Essay

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16 views5 pages

Movement Essay

Uploaded by

don.pega12
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Name: Oratile Pega

Student Number: 2703035

Abstract essay on Rudolf Laban effort cube and Trisha Brown


Locus Cube

I studied the work of Trisha Browns Locus cube and Rudolf Laban’s Effort Cube in
order to show the relationship between the two movement theories as well as how
both methods function as tools to create and develop movement dances that lead to
spatially and physically intelligence. so that my reader may know and understand the
significance of both movement tools and how they develop movement that are
spatially and physically intelligent. Also expand on Laban’s movement principles:
flow, weight, space, and time. As well as explain Kinesphere and centre gravity.

Rudolph Laban was born in Bratislava, Austria-Hungary, on December 15, 1879. He


was a dancer, choreographer, and theorist who attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in
Paris and specialized in state design, theatre, and dancing. Laban was a "founding
father of expressionist dance" and a modern dance pioneer. He believed that
movement was a combination of body, mind, space, and spirit, which is why he
developed and explored the idea of embracing organic movement as choreographic
as well as the notion of naturalised dancing in theatrical applications, which allowed
him to interrogate time and space patterns in relation to movement language. There
are two ways to interpret Laban's movement theory: The first is that transmitting
messages is viewed as an embodied communication. Second, as a reciprocal
interaction in which embodied signals are received. Laban examined the outside
usage of the four major methods and applications to his work: flow, weight, space,
and time. He utilized them as instruments to choreograph and portray inner
sentiments and intents, believing that the body communicates via movement,
posture, and gesture, as revealed by Trisha Brown's 'the pedestrian,' an abstraction
of movement.
The Effort cube, created by Rudolph Laban, incorporates both interior attitudes and
movement aspects, which are expressed by four elements: Time (quick/sustained),
Weight (heavy/light), Space (direct/indirect), and Flow (bound/free). Time may be
either swift or slow, depending on the decision making and movement punctuation.
The impact of movement may be greatly influenced by how a movement is executed,
whether it is swift or persistent. Weight identifies the purpose of an action, which
might be light or heavy, requiring a difference in energy and effort. The 'weight' of a
movement is assigned to an emotion, which subsequently acts as a signal for a
watching audience. Space can be 'direct' or 'indirect,' and it does not always refer to
the location in which you perform; rather, it refers to the quality of how you utilize
your body and attention as you move, and it considers the spatial awareness of the
body, performer, and motion. When a performer is moving with precise accuracy or
presenting a single concentrated emotional state, direct space might be effective.
When a performer is transmitting the body's energy to several locations or a multi-
focused emotional state, indirect might be effective. Flow is the sensation of a
movement that is transmitted into the performer's body as being free/fluid, when
movement is gentle, limitless, and free without any direction or clear forms, allowing
the inner feelings to emerge. Bound/withheld is when movements are more
controlled and are distinct as well as mechanical and have a beginning and end.

According to Laban, kinespheres take on varied geometric forms depending on the


individual and motions chosen. A jumping jack, for example, approaches the two-
dimensional shape of a rectangle, but one thing that all kinespheres have is the
centre of gravity, which lies at the centre of all kinespheres. Laban noted that "when
we move outside the limits of our original kinesphere, we create a new stance and
transport the kinesphere to a new place." Laban (1976, p.3)

Trisha Brown was born in Washington on November 25, 1936. She was a
choreographer and dancer who received her dance degree from Mills College and
then went on to study with Anna Halprin at Reed College before relocating to New
York City. Brown and Yvonne Rainer co-founded the experimental Judson dance
theatre ensemble, where she created her own "postmodern and rebellious"
movement style. She rose to prominence by developing the term "pure movement"
and developing a system that rejected narrative, dance psychology, and
characterization-based dance. 'Pure movement' is defined as movement that has no
implications and is not functional or pantomimic. Mechanical bodily tasks such as
bending, turning, and straightening are examples of pure movement. (Page 7 of
Molobye.K 2023) Brown is recognized as a significant abstract artist of the twentieth
and twenty-first centuries for several reasons, including her use of both public and
institutional spaces, such as museums, art galleries, and historic buildings, as well
as private and public spaces, such as homes and offices, to emphasize the abstract
meaning of her works on representation and abstraction. Brown's 'object-like'
pedestrian movement has references to narratives without relying on meaning
construction but rather on the 'kinetic function' of the performing body. She claims
that this movement tool had a particular relevance to her childhood and upbringing,
and that she performed daily duties without using transitions between each
movement to represent a distinct memory from her childhood/life. (Molobye.K 2023,
p4)

Trisha Brown created an artistic score of movement generation Locus which then
permitted both internal and external space in choreographic writing. This set is
inside a kinespheric Locus Cube, which is a twenty-seven-point cube, where each of
these points are located within the space from the lower plane to the middle place
and lastly the higher plane. Twenty six of the twenty-seven points are the letter so
the alphabet and placed starting from A in the lower plane and moving anti
clockwise. The twenty seventh point is the stillness of the performer themselves. The
sentences that brown created required her to create a sequence in which her body
would move through the space and touching the corresponding points on the cube.
The cube and performance confirmed Browns use of structure, conceptual dance
and minimalist choreography that matched the idea of ‘pure movement.’

Rudolf Laban’s said that “The human voice is body movement made audible” (Rudolf
Laban, 1945). Laban believed that movement is applied in meaning making and
embodied communication through the body which is also involved in all spheres of
life and spaces. He categorised human movement into four components, flow,
weight, space and time. Laban’s Labanotation was the notation of human movement
within the body, in space and around space which can be internal and directional.
They play around with different directions and planes/levels such as Sagittal plane,
horizontal plane and frontal plane.

Referencing:

Betty A. Block (1998) Keep Them in Their “Place”: Applying Laban's Notion of
Kinesphere and Place in Teaching Scientific Concepts, Journal of Physical Education,
Recreation &
Dance, 69:3, 43-47, DOI: https://www.tandfonline.com/action/showCitFormats?
doi=10.1080/07303084.1998.10605092

Molobye, Kamogelo
Choreographic space_Laban's mapping and pathways, (2023)

Molobye, Kamogelo
Introduction to Trisha Brown, (2023)

Molobye, Kamogelo
Keep them in their "Place": Applying Laban's Notion of Kinesphere and Place in Teaching
Scientific Concepts, (2023)

Molobye, Kamogelo
'Understanding Choreography through LMA, (2023)

Attentive movement Direct and Indirect Space (no date) Interactive quiz. Available at:
https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/s3-euw1-ap-pe-ws4-cws-documents.ri-prod/
9781138855496/quiz/chapter3-6/index.html (Accessed: 19 May 2023).

Dance - ct.gov (no date) Dance glossary . Available at:


https://portal.ct.gov/-/media/SDE/Arts/Guide-to-K12-Program-Development-in-the-
Arts/Dance-Introduction.pdf (Accessed: 19 May 2023).

Bartenieff, I. (no date) Laban theory: Irmgard Bartenieff, Laban theory | Irmgard Bartenieff.
Available at: https://exhibitions.lib.umd.edu/bartenieff/laban-theory#:~:text=Effort%2C
%20as%20Laban%20theorized%2C%20encompasses,Flow%20(Bound%2FFree).
(Accessed: 19 May 2023).

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