James Waring

James Waring (November 1, 1922 - December 2, 1975) was a dancer, choreographer, costume designer, theatre director, playwright, poet, and visual artist, based in New York City from 1949 until his death in 1975.

He was a prolific choreographer and teacher.

Waring's training began in 1939 in San Francisco and Oakland at the age of 17.

He was exposed to numerous kinds of dancing, including ballet at the San Francisco Ballet School with Harold Christensen and his brother, the Graham technique with Gertrude Schurr, and the interpretive dance of Raoul Pausé.

Later, after serving in the Army in World War II, he studied in New York City at the School of American Ballet, and with Anna Halprin, Louis Horst, Antony Tudor, and Anatole Vilzak, and also took some classes with Merce Cunningham.

Waring was very attracted to ballet and intrigued by its complex history and sensibility, and dance historian David Vaughan suggests that Waring's extensive knowledge of dance history played an important role in his work; Waring's dances became more balletic over time.

In 1946, Waring presented the first of the over 135 original works he would create over the course of his career, "Luther Burbank in Santa Rosa", at the Halprin-Lathrop Studio Theater.

Other works he showed during this period were based on or influenced by Japanese Noh drama, the work of Edgar Allan Poe and primitive art, as well as the ballets of George Balanchine and the dancing of Alexandra Danilova, taking from these sources what interested him and mixing them together.

The style of his dances varied according to the time and his interests, and could be formal and abstract or theatrical and romantic, influenced not only by the choreography of the moment, but also by the theatricality of the past: vaudeville and the music hall, commedia dell'arte and the circus, and both musical and silent films all played a part in Waring's work.

The question then arises if Waring's choreographic collages were simply a pastiche of their original sources, or if he had indeed created something new and different from the raw material they provided; was his work "camp", poetic, or postmodern?

Even people who liked Waring's work – including dancers he had taught and influenced – disagreed with each other about whether his pieces were a "mishmash" or not.

He has been called "one of the most influential figures in the New York avant-garde in the late fifties and early sixties", "one of dance's great eccentrics", "a focal point for dance experimentation before the existence of the Judson Dance Theater", and "the quintessential Greenwich Village choreographer in the late 1950s and 1960s".

Waring's collage style of building dance works influenced the development of the avant-garde Happenings which were staged in the late 1950s.

According to Leslie Satin, although Waring was a seminal influence on modern and post-modern dance in New York City, his position in both the mainstream and the avant-garde was somewhat tentative, primarily because of the fluidity of Waring's style and the variety of his interests, which sometimes cut against the grain of both worlds.

His use of "low" material from the popular arts also worked against his reputation in both contexts.

Waring was among a group of choreographers and dancers in New York who, in 1951, created Dance Associates, a co-operative which included Aileen Passloff, Tanaquil Le Clercq from the New York City Ballet, Marian Sarach, Paul Taylor, David Vaughn, dance writer Edward Denby, actor Alix Rubin and others.

Although Dance Associates garnered a significant amount of work, its annual concerts at the Amato Opera House were not critically successful, and did not draw a significant audience, even though they were free.

Other titles included Burlesca (1953), Little Kootch Piece (1955), and The Cobra Ballet (1970).

In 1954, Waring began presenting works with his own company in annual concerts, continuing to do so until 1969.

He also choreographed for other companies and performers, including Manhattan Festival Ballet – which he was instrumental in founding, the Netherlands Dance Theater, the Pennsylvania Ballet, as well as Toby Armour's New England Dinosaur, the companies of Raymond Johnson, Ze'eva Cohen, and Violette Verdy, and the 5 x 2 Company of Bruce Becker and Jane Kosminsky.

Notable among Waring's works were Phrases (1955), Dances before the Wall (1958), Dromenon (1961), Variations on a Landscape, Sinfonia semplice, and Amoretti.

In 1959 and 1960, Waring organized performances at the Living Theatre – in whose building he held his composition class – in which his students presented their works; these were a precursor to the Judson Church performances, although Waring, who was 10 years older than the Judson dancers, was never a "member".

Still, several of his pieces were presented at Judson concerts.

Waring was supportive of the Judson Church dance movement, although he was critical of the church as a venue – seeing it more as a place for experimentation rather than a formal performance space – and critical also of some of the work presented there which, according to Yvonne Rainer, he found "dry and boring."

Waring's own aesthetic was more inclined to be romantic, rather than formally objective, as much of the work by the Judson dancers was.

Experimental composers that Waring worked with included John Herbert McDowell – who himself choreographed a piece in honor of Waring at one of the Judson Dance Theater concerts – Philip Corner, Malcolm Goldstein, Hy Gubernick, Terry Jennings, Richard Maxfield, and Marga Richter.

He also collaborated with visual artists who created sets or costumes for his pieces – although he often did the costumes himself.

In fact he designed and made many costumes for his colleagues as well, including Twyla Tharp, Remy Charlip, and Aileen Passloff.

Waring worked at various times with Julian Beck, George Brecht, Red Grooms, Al Hansen, Robert Indiana, Jasper Johns, Larry Poons, Robert Watts, Robert Whitman, and John Wulp.

Some of these artists were involved in the creation of "Happenings", which were free-form inter-disciplinary multi-media events, each one unique, and Waring encouraged this new form; he aided Allen Kaprow in putting on one of his first ones.

He wrote poetry, plays, essays and dance criticism, and was one of the founders in 1961 of the New York Poets Theatre, also known as the American Theater for Poets; his plays were also presented there and at the Judson Poets Theater.

Waring's Imperceptible Elongation No. 1, which he referred to as a "Happening", was five seconds long, but his At the Hallelujah Gardens (1963) was a spectacle which included "a white balloon tree, live geese, and potatoes, and intermittent dance sequences and events: a piece that 'overran its bounds in all directions'."

It was set to any music that was "big, classical, and perversely overwhelming."

Numerous dancers who went on to prominence danced in Waring's company, including Toby Armour, Joan Baker, Richard Colton, Arlene Rothlein, and Ruth Sobotka.

Later dancers who would go on to found the Judson Dance Theater and create postmodern dance studied with Waring or danced in his company, including Lucinda Childs, David Gordon, Sally Gross, Deborah Hay, Fred Herko, Gretchen MacLane, Michael Mao, Meredith Monk, Yvonne Rainer, and Valda Setterfield.

Aside from the dancers who passed through his pieces and classes in New York City, others were influenced by Waring during the 10 years he spent teaching at Indian Hill, which was a summer arts camp in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

Waring also organized events such as the Pocket Follies benefit in 1963 at the Pocket Theater, which featured many dancers associated with Waring as well as George Brecht, Jill Johnston, and Robert Rauschenberg, and two months of weekly "Events and Entertainments" at the same venue in 1964.

Waring was a writer as well.

The critic Don McDonagh called Waring's At the Café Fleurette (1968), which was performed in the style of the turn of the 20th century, a "small masterpiece", and pointed out that Waring was fond of absurd titles such as Pumpernickle and Circumstance and Tomato Exposé.

He disbanded his company in 1975, shortly before his death, but, in 1974, his male dancers formed Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, a travesty dance ensemble in which the men perform as ballerinas.