A little bit more...

Learning even more about Loie has been incredibly interesting and I commend her so much for what she did. She inspired other newer artists such as Alwin Nicolais with her fascination with lighting and interesting costumes. As a child/young adult she was a traveling skirt dancer which makes perfect sense why she decided to elongate her skirt and was able to control it better than other 'real' dancers would have. The skirts she used were gestural in nature and extremely expressive. It took away the individuality of a costume and allowed her to be comfortable in her own body unlike those of the ballet world who were in large lavish costumes. This is when Loie began her quest to liberate women along with Isadora Duncan. They focused on freeing women of corsets and uncomfortable shoes but dancing in flowing fabric and barefoot. Loie was not recognized as a dancer until she moved to Europe which helped her find people in politics such as Queen Marie to be able to promote her and also allow Loie to be involved in politics which in America she most likely wouldn't have. She helped allied countries as mentioned below because of her connections and she was later decorated by the countries she helped. Loie Fuller was very involved and inspired by local artists and musicians in Europe, where at that time they were plentiful. One of her close friends Sam Hill had bought a property in which Loie and Queen Marie had made into a museum after Sam had died and dedicated it to him because of his passion for art. Even though she had not had formal training she still made a huge impact on the world of dance and it is still evident today in choreographers because of the way they use lighting and costumes patented by Loie. It's hard to believe that people aren't meant to do something with their lives when people like this are presented in history, just makes me wonder who is next in our generation or in future generations to develope something new for the dance world since it is ever-growing.

Why I care....

Before this class I had never really known who Loie Fuller was. I knew of her but I no idea what she did for the dance world. It took me until after I performed a dance I choreographed inspired by her to really understand the greatness she gave to dancers today. She was a pioneer in lighting design and also natural movement unlike that of the ballets. In my piece I made it a point to have lighting of various colors and did my best to make a flowing costume similar to the one she used in the past. I did more research on the company Time Lapse Dance with the director Jody Sperling, she has done many dances inspired by Loie which is where I started when thinking about my piece. They had done a piece called "The Peacock" and it was a total inspiration to my creative mind and I began to think of other birds and the beautiful colors their feathers can create. I used various colors such as blue, red, green and yellow to be projected onto the skirt. I love that Loie took the initiative to create a new 'look' for dance with different colored lighting. It opened up so many doors for the rest of the world to make their dances more interesting by adding such a simple aspect.