The View from the Far Seats

Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky, “Dance Curves: On the Dances of Palucca” (1926) From 1921 to 1923, German dancer and choreographer Gret Palucca studied with Mary Wigman, the pioneer of expressionist dance and one of the most important figures in the history of contemporary dance. In 1925, Palucca opened her own dance studio in Dresden and developed close contacts with various Bauhaus instructors, many of whom greatly admired her dance style. Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky’s four “analytical drawings”, which were based on photographs of Palucca by Charlotte Rudolph, illustrate how closely the dancer’s style coincided with the Bauhaus aesthetic. The drawings and photographs were published in the arts journal Das Kunstblatt in 1926. According to Kandinsky, Palucca’s art was characterized by “1. Simplicity of the whole form, and 2. being based on the large form”. Courtesy of GHDI (German History in Documents and Images).