Paul Taylor Dance Company to perform at the Phillips Center on Oct. 30

October 11, 2007

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Paul Taylor was once called the “naughty boy” of the dance world by the queen of modern herself, Martha Graham. But rather than take affront, he chose to laugh the moniker off. Thankfully, he’s been laughing for more than 50 years.

The Paul Taylor Dance Company sets the gold standard when it comes to modern dance. Taylor had no formal dance training when he attended Syracuse University on a swimming scholarship — his goal was to become a visual artist. But then he discovered dance. He left Syracuse and transferred to Juilliard where his natural athleticism helped with his early work. One can still see expressions of it in his choreography today.

As a young dancer, Taylor was fortunate to work with some of the preeminent dance masters of the day including Graham, Merce Cunningham, Anthony Tudor, Doris Humphrey and Louis Horst. But while he was performing others’ steps, Taylor could envision the dances done differently, in his own style. When he wasn’t dancing, he was choreographing his own work. In the early 1950s, while a member of Graham’s company, Taylor staged his compositions on the side at places such as the Henry Street Settlement, Hunter College Playhouse and the 92nd Street Y. By 1962, Taylor felt confident enough to strike out on his own.

“The time had come, I thought, and I gave a year’s notice. She never scolded me or said anything. I had her blessing. She always came to see my work,” Taylor says.

Later than same year, Taylor’s ground-breaking “Aureole” made its debut and immediately caught the attention of many dance aficionados with its freshness and vitality. Also called Taylor’s “white ballet,” “Auerole” features two men and three women, all dressed in white, skimming, leaping and jumping onstage. The work has been oft-repeated, and has even been performed by non-modern companies such as the Royal Danish Ballet.

But while “Auerole” captured attention with its breath-taking beauty, other works caught attention in a different way. In the infamous ” Duet, ” Taylor and his partner didn’t move at all. Not once for the entire piece, which ran four and one-half minutes in length. Not to be outdone by Taylor’s cheek, Horst, Taylor’s former teacher, famously wrote a critique of the work that was nothing but four inches of white space.

Naughty boy, indeed.

Taylor’s not about breaking rules. He’s about ignoring them altogether. And that’s a good thing because it’s led to the development of some of modern dance’s most iconic pieces. “Auerole” paired modern movement with the classicism of Handel — but audiences loved it anyway. “Big Bertha” explored incest — and removed some of its taboo. “Klezmerbluegrass” combined two seemingly disparate musical genres together — and found the foundation that unites them both. Taylor has used his works to make fun of the Ku Klux Klan and feminism, underscore the high price of war and explore dualities such as good and evil, love and hate, joy and fear. His work is prolific — more than 100 pieces in his company’s repertoire to date — and he keeps creating them, proving that he’s not done yet.

In his 50-plus years at the forefront of modern dance, Taylor has garnered a number of prestigious awards and honors. He was awarded the National Medal of the Arts by President Clinton in 1993. In 1992 he was a recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors and received an Emmy award for “Speaking in Tongues,” produced by WNET/New York the previous year. In 1995 he received the Algur H. Meadows Award for Excellence in the Arts, and was named one of 50 prominent Americans honored in recognition of their outstanding achievement by the Library of Congress’s Office of Scholarly Programs. He was elected to knighthood by the French government as “Chevalier de l’Ordre des Art es Lettres” in 1969 and has since been elevated to the ranks of Officer (1984) and “Commandeur” (1990). In January 2000 he was awarded France’s highest honor, the “Légion d’Honneur,” for exceptional contributions to French culture.

Mr. Taylor is the recipient of three Guggenheim Fellowships and has received honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degrees from the California Institute of the Arts, Connecticut College, Duke University, Juilliard, Skidmore College, the State University of New York at Purchase and Syracuse University. Awards for lifetime achievement include a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship — often called the “genius award” — and the Samuel H. Scripps American Dance Festival Award. Other awards include the New York State Governor’s Arts Award and the New York City Mayor’s Award of Honor for Art and Culture. In 1989 he was elected one of 10 honorary American members of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters.

Paul Taylor’s autobiography, Private Domain, originally published by Alfred A. Knopf and re-released by North Point Press and later by the University of Pittsburgh Press, was nominated by the National Book Critics Circle as the most distinguished biography of 1987. Mr. Taylor and his company are the subject of Dancemaker, Matthew Diamond’s award-winning, Academy Award-nominated film, hailed by Time as “perhaps the best dance documentary ever.”

The Paul Taylor Dance Company will perform at the Phillips Center for the Performing Arts at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday Oct . 30. There will be a post-performance discussion with the company. Tickets are: $35, front orchestra, mezzanine and mid-orchestra; $30, rear orchestra; and $25, balcony.

Tickets are available by calling the Phillips Center Box Office at 352-392-ARTS (2787) or 800-905-ARTS (toll-free within Florida) or by calling Ticketmaster at 904-353-3309 or toll free at 800-277-1700. Orders may also be faxed to 352-846-1562. Tickets are also available in person at the Phillips Center Box Office, University Box Office at the University of Florida Reitz Union and all Ticketmaster outlets; and on the web at www.ticketmaster.com. Cash, checks, Visa and MasterCard are accepted. Group tickets are also available.

The Phillips Center Box Office is open Monday – Saturday, noon to 6 p.m. and two hours prior to the performance. Performance dates, times and programs are subject to change.