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To seek in nature the fairest forms and to find the movement which expresses the soul of these forms — this is the art of the dancer. It is from nature alone that the dancer must draw his inspirations, in the same manner as the sculptor, with whom he has so many affinities. Rodin has said: “To produce good sculpture it is not necessary to copy the works of antiquity; it is necessary first of all to regard the works of nature, and to see in those of the classics only the method by which they have interpreted nature.” Rodin is right; and in my art I have by no means copied, as has been supposed, the figures of Greek vases, friezes and paintings. From them I have learned to regard nature, and when certain of my movements recall the gestures that are seen in works of art, it is only because, like them, they are drawn from the grand natural source.
My inspiration has been drawn from trees, from waves, from clouds, from the sympathies that exist between passion and the storm, between gentleness and the soft breeze, and the like, and I always endeavour to put into my movements a little of that divine continuity which gives to the whole of nature its beauty and its life.
Isadora Duncan, As quoted in Modern Dancing and Dancers, 1912 by John Ernest Crawford Flitch, p. 105.
Isadora Duncan. Born in San Francisco, 1877. Died in Nice, 1927, strangled by her own scarf.
She invented modern dance. Barefoot, flowing tunics, hair loose. While everyone else was doing rigid ballet bullshit, she was moving like a human being, free, natural, expressive. Danced to Beethoven, to Chopin. Made it look like breathing.
Free love. Bohemian life. Had kids out of wedlock, didn’t care what anyone thought. Lived in Europe, danced for packed houses, changed everything about how people understood movement and the body.
1913: her two children, Deirdre and Patrick, drown in the Seine. The car they’re in with their nanny stalls on a bridge, rolls backward into the river. Both kids gone. Just like that.
She never really recovered. Kept dancing, kept living, but something broke that day and didn’t come back.
September 14th, 1927. Nice, France. She’s riding in an open car, wearing a long silk scarf. Her signature. She says “Adieu, mes amis. Je vais à la gloire!”
“Farewell, my friends. I go to glory!”
The scarf catches in the wheel. Snaps her neck instantly. Fifty years old.
The thing that made her iconic, that flowing, dramatic scarf, killed her in the most absurd, horrible way possible.
Genius. Tragedy. A death so perfectly, cruelly ironic it almost feels made up.
But it’s not.
Shot on infrared film in Père Lachaise Cemetery. Signed Limited Edition 17” x11” print of 10; stamped on verso. Professional black & white printing on Hahnemühle fibre-based Matt paper.