ABSTRACT
Cunningham’s smiling recall of his happy first dance steps bespoke the love he has displayed over the years for both performing and creating dances. The year he turned seventy-five also marked the fiftieth anniversary of his career as choreographer. He began his actual dance training at the age of twelve with Mrs J.W.Barrett, in what might be called all-round theatrical dancing. His entry into the then-budding world of modern dance had come by way of the Cornish School in Seattle, Washington, an institute for the performing and plastic arts where Cunningham had been studying to be an actor. There, dance teacher Bonnie Bird and composer John Cage-then a Cornish School faculty member and eventually Cunningham’s lifelong partner in art and life-suggested that Cunningham study at the Bennington School of Dance, which was spending a summer at Mills College in California. Martha Graham was on its faculty and she subsequently encouraged Cunningham to move east, where he became a member of Graham’s dance troupe.
