“Her costume consisted of a tight-fitting bodice that left the neck and shoulders bare, and a diaphanous, bell-shaped skirt. Marie Taglioni’s debut of La Sylphide was one of the first performances to be on pointe, and the first dancer to wear a tutu. Ballet now is so focused on the feet that it is hard to imagine that people were shocked when the skirt was shortened even just a little bit. Her motive was not to show more skin, but to showcase her intricate footwork. In the eighteenth century, Marie Camargo shortened her dress from floor length to above the ankle. Ballet at the time was not that technical, so it was reasonable that as the standard of dancing rose the attire needed to develop to accommodate the dancers. The clothing they wore was their normal court attire which was very restrictive for men and women (Wagner, 2002). At this time there was no clothing necessarily labelled as ballet costumes. Ballet dance was originally to entertain the royal courts of France and Italy. These observations are correct, but the intent behind these alterations is to accentuate the body and showcase the line of these dancers. Paglia points out that the classical long ballet skirts have become “just a fringe of chiffon at the hips,” and the tights of male dancers “accent bulging genitals and buttocks” (Paglia, 1994, p. The aesthetic of ballet dance has not changed much, but there has been a development of the costumes or lack of costumes. Proper, elegant, sophisticated, conservative, and dainty are words I would use to describe a ballet dancer. The question I am trying to understand is whether a naked body in the genre of dance is art or nothing more than striptease.Įntry 2: Less Clothing for Ballet Dancers I agree that through nudity or even skimpy costumes that as a culture we have become more accustomed to seeing naked bodies or on the other hand less shy to shed some layers. Clearly, the naked body is valued as art by some members of the dance community, and I hope to understand their intentions. I disagree with Paglia that contemporary dance is the sole reason for topless girls and strip bars. Isadora Duncan as a feminist would more than likely agree that “there is nothing degrading in the display of any part of the human body” (Paglia, 1994, p. It is unsure whether the state should be neutral or not on issues or careers that deal with nudity or scandalous behaviour in order to act in the best interest of women or viewers in the community however, everyone has a right to their body and what they do with their body. It is hard to imagine why classical ballet or the choreographers Isadora Duncan and Martha Graham would come up in a politics course. At university, I find it fascinating when I have a politics paper and dance paper that correlate. Beyond ballet, she blames the progression of sexual movement on Isadora Duncan’s philosohpy of freedom and Martha Graham’s style of dance. 62) which I hope to understand whether dance is more than that or not. She labels dance “striptease in the name of high art,”(Paglia, 1994, p. She gives examples of how ballet costumes have changed from being modest to scanty. “Vamps and Tramps” by Camille Paglia blames striptease and nudity in society on the explicit dance that developed in the 19th and 20th century. Throughout this journal I want to look at the evolution of nudity in dance. Entry One: “Striptease in the Name of High Art”
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