Dance for export : cultural diplomacy and the Cold War / Naima Prevots ; introduction by Eric Foner.

By: Material type: TextTextSeries: Studies in dance historyPublication details: Hanover ; London : Wesleyan University Press ; Pulished by University Press of New England, ©1998.Description: xii, 174 p. : ill.; 27 cmISBN:
  • 081956365X
  • 9780819563651
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 21 792.8097309045 PRE
LOC classification:
  • GV1623 .P72 1998
Contents:
Introduction / by Eric Fowler -- Prologue -- Eisenhower's Fund -- Starting Out -- ANTA, the Dance Panel, and Martha Graham -- The Avant-Garde Conundrum -- Ballet and Soviet-American Exchange -- African-American Artists -- How Broad a Spectrum? -- On the Home Front -- Notes -- Members of the ANTA Dance Panel.
Summary: "At the height of the Cold War in 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower inaugurated a program of cultural exchange that sent American dancers and other artists to political 'hot spots' overseas. This peacetime gambit by a wartime hero to win the hearts and minds of Cold War enemies was a resounding success. As a journalist in the Far East noted, tours by American artists "dispelled the notion that Americans live in a cultural wasteland peopled only with gadgets and frankfurters and aton bombs." Never before had dance, theater, and music received direct government support, and although earmarked only for tours outside the country, the funding was a godsend to cash-starved American dance companies even as it put them on the international map. Among the artists chosen for international duty were José Limón, who led his company on the first government-sponsored tour of South America; Martha Graham, whose famed ensemble criss-crossed southeast Asia; Alvin Ailey, whose company brought audiences to their feet throughout the South Pacific; and George Balanchine, whose New York City Ballet crowned its triumphant visits to Western Europe and Japan with an epoch-making tour in 1962 of the Soviet Union. The success of Eisenhower's program of cultural export led directly to the creation of the National Endowment for the Arts and Washington's Kennedy Center. As historian Eric Foner points out in his introduction, the book offers a rare, behind-the-scenes glimpse of the politics of the dance world in the 1950s. Although, the blue-ribbon Dance Panel that chose the attractions for export went out of its way to be fair, it could not escape the prejudices of the time. With its fervent belief in high art, the panel disdained popular dance forms such as tap. At the same time, it had little patience with the avant-garde work of Merce Cunningham and Alwin Nikolais that was beginning to transform modern dance." -- Book Jacket
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Item type Current library Collection Call number Status Notes Date due Barcode
Books Books Academy of Music & Performing Arts Library General Stacks Non-fiction 792.8097309045 PRE (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Available Kindly donated by J. Dyson A06437
Browsing Academy of Music & Performing Arts Library shelves, Shelving location: General Stacks, Collection: Non-fiction Close shelf browser (Hides shelf browser)
792.80973 SIE At the vanishing point : 792.80973 STE Dance as life : 792.80973 TER The dance in America / 792.8097309045 PRE Dance for export : 792.809747 BEN Winter season : 792.8097471 BAN Democracy's body : 792.8097471 BUR Judson Dance Theater :

Includes bibliographical references (p. 151-159) and index.

Introduction / by Eric Fowler -- Prologue -- Eisenhower's Fund -- Starting Out -- ANTA, the Dance Panel, and Martha Graham -- The Avant-Garde Conundrum -- Ballet and Soviet-American Exchange -- African-American Artists -- How Broad a Spectrum? -- On the Home Front -- Notes -- Members of the ANTA Dance Panel.

"At the height of the Cold War in 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower inaugurated a program of cultural exchange that sent American dancers and other artists to political 'hot spots' overseas. This peacetime gambit by a wartime hero to win the hearts and minds of Cold War enemies was a resounding success. As a journalist in the Far East noted, tours by American artists "dispelled the notion that Americans live in a cultural wasteland peopled only with gadgets and frankfurters and aton bombs." Never before had dance, theater, and music received direct government support, and although earmarked only for tours outside the country, the funding was a godsend to cash-starved American dance companies even as it put them on the international map.
Among the artists chosen for international duty were José Limón, who led his company on the first government-sponsored tour of South America; Martha Graham, whose famed ensemble criss-crossed southeast Asia; Alvin Ailey, whose company brought audiences to their feet throughout the South Pacific; and George Balanchine, whose New York City Ballet crowned its triumphant visits to Western Europe and Japan with an epoch-making tour in 1962 of the Soviet Union. The success of Eisenhower's program of cultural export led directly to the creation of the National Endowment for the Arts and Washington's Kennedy Center.
As historian Eric Foner points out in his introduction, the book offers a rare, behind-the-scenes glimpse of the politics of the dance world in the 1950s. Although, the blue-ribbon Dance Panel that chose the attractions for export went out of its way to be fair, it could not escape the prejudices of the time. With its fervent belief in high art, the panel disdained popular dance forms such as tap. At the same time, it had little patience with the avant-garde work of Merce Cunningham and Alwin Nikolais that was beginning to transform modern dance." -- Book Jacket

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