ABSTRACT
Delsarte, Decroux et al lived in a world impacted by the Dress Reform Movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. They rejected restrictive clothing, laced corsets, rigid collars, clenched neck ties, tightly buttoned shoes, vests, suspenders and belts worn by many middle-class people. In 1923–24, partial nudity reclaimed the expressive potential of the trunk, playing an essential role in masked improvisations Decroux observed at Copeau's Ecole du Vieux Colombier. Later, in 1931–32, Decroux advocated partial nudity in actor training and performance when teaching at the Atelier Theatre.
In Decroux's daily life and in his research, he attempted to extend the physical and psychic range of the human form to liberate himself not only from confining clothing but also from mental constraints—from mental binding of his time that advocated covering the human form when he championed revealing it. Eschewing traditional ways of imagining and moving the human body, he placed his own and his students’ bodies into precarious positions, following the energetic lines of classical sculpture and contemporary sport. Thus, in their effort to create “new” arts, Decroux, as well as modern dancers, engendered arts that resembled ancient ones, just as Dress Reform garments recalled the less constricting togas, tunics and capes from earlier times. Finally, I suggest that Decroux, through the category homme de sport, helped actors realize an “alchemical” acting, performing in a way that inspired some of Artaud's most passionate writing.
