Contemporary dance is a term usually referring to the 20th century concert dance that combines elements of modern dance and classical ballet. It does not refuse classical ballet's leg technique in favor of modern dance's stress on the torso, while it also employs contact-release, floor work, fall and recovery, and improvisation characteristic of modern dance. Unpredictable changes in rhythm, speed, and direction are often used, as well.
It can use elements from non-western dance cultures, for example, elements from African dance such as bent knees, or elements from the Japanese contemporary dance Butoh.
Read more about Contemporary Dance: History, Cunningham's Key Ideas, Choreographer's Role, Dance Technique
Famous quotes containing the words contemporary and/or dance:
“Literature that is not the breath of contemporary society, that dares not transmit the pains and fears of that society, that does not warn in time against threatening moral and social dangers—such literature does not deserve the name of literature; it is only a façade. Such literature loses the confidence of its own people, and its published works are used as wastepaper instead of being read.”
—Alexander Solzhenitsyn (b. 1918)
“God be with the times when I
Cared not a thraneen for what chanced
So that I had the limbs to try
Such a dance as there was danced—
Love is like the lion’s tooth.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)