Feb 25 / Expressionist Dance: Ceremonies, Movement, Sound and Word
REVIEW
Watch the following video.
Students discuss among themselves Mary Wigman's ideas about dance. Using the questions below as prompts, they write about them and post their reflections on Discussion Board.
- Understand the application of the idea of "dance as a ceremony"
- Explain how "naturalistic movement, large-scale unison and characterization" bring to the dancer's new possibilities for expressive movement.
- Gain awareness of the importance that "movement, text and drama combined make a performance as powerful as a real life experience"
- Experience the body's limitations when dancing to develop your own sense of " fallibility of the human condition"
- Reflect on the work done in class
Harald Kreutzberg
Question 2
What qualities of Wigman's movement groups are shown in Harald Kreutzberg's dance?
3
Choose from Wigman's technique, which is structured in five main groups:
1 - Striding and sliding
2 - Springs, vibrations and bouncing
3 - Momentum and oscillations
4 - Falling and dropping (floor technique)
5 - Tensions: relaxed, sustained and motor tensions
Movement, Sound, Word
Question 3
Why is the use movement, sound and word important aspects of expressionist dance?
5
Read the Article
Converging Movements: Modern Dance and Jewish Culture at the 92 Street Y
Naomi M. Jackson
Read: Introduction
https://www.google.com/books/edition/Converging_Movements/ZE6tOEj7CXkC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=modern+Dance&printsec=frontcover
Jackson, Naomi M. (2000). Converging Movements: Modern Dance and Jewish Culture at the 92 Street Y. Wesleyan University Press.
Question 4
Summarize the introduction to the book above.
V
A Note to Remember
Kurt's most international piece, The Green Table, was inspired by the
medieval artwork “Lubeck’s Dance of Death” and Germany’s collapsed
economy. It was a powerful anti-war statement portraying leaders over a
conference table declaring war, soldiers, women, profiteers and
patriots suffering from war’s horrors, and looming over everything and
returning onstage constantly is the figure of death.
VI
Case Study
Interview with Kurt Jooss
Question 4
What does Jooss mean when he says that The Green Table is a ceremony of death?
VII
Activity
Ceremony: the ritual observances and procedures performed at grand and formal occasions.
The Green Table
After seeing the video clip of The Green Table, which you have seen before, use it as a reference to create your own plot line and turn it into a story/ceremony.
Group Work
Add to your group's piece the concept of ceremony through an 8 movement phrase.
VIII
Journaling
IX
Glossary
X
Sources
XI
Students' Work
Question #1
Watching Wigman’s dance performance, I was fascinated by how much emotion she
could transmit without relying on traditional technique and beauty. Her movements felt raw,
grounded, and sometimes even uncomfortable, but they had undeniable power. Every gesture
seemed to carry emotional weight, and I got the feeling that she wasn’t performing for
entertainment, but to express something deeply personal. The use of space, tension, and
grounded movement made her dance feel almost ritualistic, like a physician manifestation of
internal struggle and reflection.
Question #2
Harald Kreutzberg’s dance clearly carries qualities from Wigman’s movement groups,
especially in the way he uses strong, deliberate gestures to convey deep emotional states. His
movements are expressive and dramatic, emphasizing weight, tension, and pauses to highlight
inner conflict, much like Wigman. Kreutzberg’s performance reflects Wigman’s focus on
expressing emotion over form, and you can see her influence in the way Kreutzberg allows his
whole body to speak emotionally, not just his face and limbs. There is rawness and urgency to his
movement that feels rooted to Wigman’s expressionist ideas.
Question #3
In Wigman’s technique, structured into five main groups, the use of movement, sound,
and word are important because they allow a dancer to express complex emotional or
psychological states beyond the limits of traditional dance forms. Movement connects the body
with raw emotion, sound enhances the feeling without relying on formal music, and the word
introduces poetic dimension. In expressionist dance, these elements are combined to create
performances that are deeply personal and layered, opening multiple interpretations for the
audience and emphasizing emotional truth over polished aesthetics.
Question #4
The Introduction of Converging Movements discusses how different modern dance
traditions evolved independently, but shared similar foundational or underlying ideas. It explains
that expressionist dance, ballet, and other forms were often viewed as separate, but actually
intersect in surprising ways. The introduction highlights the importance of cultural, historical,
and political influences on dance development, showing how artists responded to the world
around them. Their dance form was their reaction and response to the environment that
surrounded them.
When Jooss says that The Green Table is a “ceremony of death”, he means that the piece
isn’t just about war in its literal sense, but about the ritualistic yet inevitable destruction caused
by human conflict. The “ceremony” refers to the repeated, formalized way in which leaders talk
and debate about war while people suffer and die. The Green Table symbolizes how death is
treated almost like a routine. It’s cold, detached, and performed repeatedly with each new
conflict. Jooss captures the tragedy of war being an endless cycle by showing death not as a
sudden event, but a structured and inevitable outcome of human behavior.
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