Clara Gibson Maxwell

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Clara Gibson Maxwell
Maxwell in 2024
Born1958
Clarksburg, West Virginia, USA
EducationJuilliard School Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance 1984
Occupation(s)Dancer, choreographer
Years active1985–present
Career
Current groupMon Oncle d'Amérique Productions
DancesOphélie Song (1989), Cartesian Women (1994), Corpus (1998), The Banquet (2001), Encuentro-Encuentro (2011), Thoreau's Henhawk Visits Mexico (2021)

Clara Gibson Maxwell is an American dancer and choreographer living in Paris, France since 1985. Her choreography first received public recognition in 1989 with Ophélie Song.[1][2][3]

Biography[edit]

Family[edit]

Clara Gibson Maxwell is a seventh-generation West Virginian. She was born in Clarksburg, the elder daughter of Frank Jarvis Maxwell Jr., a lawyer, judge and politician who was member of the West Virginia House of Delegates (1951–1956), County Clerk (1972–1984), and Circuit Court Judge (1984–1992)[4] and Susan Cone Harnish, Professor of English literature.[5] Her father’s engagement in local politics and both parents’ passion for the arts[6] imprinted Clara Gibson Maxwell’s childhood.

Education[edit]

Clara Gibson Maxwell studied Philosophy and Visual Arts (film and dance) at Harvard University from 1976–1978.[7] [8] She then trained at the Juilliard School and obtained a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance in 1984.[9]

Civism[edit]

Clara Gibson Maxwell has written about social and political affairs in her home state of West Virginia.

  • "Should Clarksburg Build New Cultural Center or Renovate Rose Garden Theater?" [10]
  • "Don't be Penny-Wise, Pound Foolish with Our Future." [11]

Philanthropy[edit]

Maxwell created the arts-educational Appalachian Springs Foundation (ASF) in 2015.[12] The foundation espouses an egalitarian vision of the creative process, defined by parity of artistic elements and contributing participants in civic education, the performing and visual arts, somatic practices, and new music.[13]

Among projects already sponsored by Appalachian Springs Foundation are the Third Thursdays Harmolodic Concert Series (Cambridge, MA)[14] and two Dave Bryant albums, Garden of Equilibria and Night Visitors, each named by jazz critics as one of the ten-best jazz albums of the years 2015 and 2020, respectively.[15][16] Appalachian Springs Foundation also supported Anagram, an experimental film by Nathaniel Draper[17] and In Vain, Anastasia Melia Eleftheriou's "poetic cinema" project.[17]

Choreography[edit]

Major influences[edit]

Alexander Technique, the apprenticeship of efficient movement through self-knowledge guided by a somatic practitioner, provided a framework for Maxwell’s evolution from Harvard philosophy student to Juilliard School dance professional. Maxwell's own private Alexander Technique practice thrived in Paris between 1999 and 2009.[18]

At Juilliard, the teachers Anna Sokolow, a major figure of the American modern dance tradition, and the German expressionist Hanya Holm marked her future as dancer and choreographer.[9] Additional mentoring was found at The First Zen Institute of America, from Antony Tudor, the British inventor of “psychological” ballet and choreographer at Julliard.[19] In Paris, Clara Gibson Maxwell’s art acquired texture through dialogues with Greek-French philosopher of the imagination Cornelius Castoriadis[20] and American jazz saxophonist and composer Ornette Coleman.[21]

Dialogues[edit]

The specificity of Maxwell’s contribution to Dance stems from her connecting dance to philosophy with Cartesian Women (Descartes) in 1995,[22] Corps Eros (Hesiod) in 1997[8] and Thoreau’s Henhawk Visits Mexico in 2017 and 2021.[23][24]

Her relationship to music is jazz and improvisation inspired. Maxwell’s dances extend Ornette Coleman’s harmolodics (improvisation in which melody, rhythm and harmony have equal value) to choreography, thanks to a collaboration with the Pulitzer Prize winning composer begun in 1990.[8]

Maxwell’s track record of site-responsive choreography includes Corpus in 1998 [24] at the Convent of Sainte Marie de La Tourette in L'Arbresle (Le Corbusier) and the Banquet in 2001[24] at Taliesin West,[25] headquarters of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, where she was resident artist and teacher for The Taliesin Fellowship.[26]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Mark Gevisser. "Rue with a Difference, The Village Voice, Vol 34 (No 27), 4 July 1989" (PDF). Retrieved 30 March 2024.
  2. ^ Christian Freyburger. "Dance Review, Joyce Vol.16 (Juillet/Août 1989)" (PDF). Retrieved 31 March 2024.
  3. ^ Carol Thomas Neely. "Documents in Madness, in Shakespearean Tragedy and Gender, ed. Shirley Nelson Garner and Madelon Sprengnether (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1996), pp. 75-104" (PDF). Retrieved 16 March 2024.
  4. ^ "Harrison County Records, Clarksburg WV". Retrieved 15 November 2023.
  5. ^ "Susan Cone Harnish". Retrieved 24 March 2024.
  6. ^ "Renaissance Man Frank Jarvis Maxwell Jr". Retrieved 15 December 2023.
  7. ^ Harvard-Radcliffe Freshman Register, Class of 1980, Harvard University Archives.
  8. ^ a b c "Maxwell's Modern Dance Revolution". Retrieved 7 November 2023.
  9. ^ a b "Juilliard School 1983-1984 Dance Scrapbook". Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  10. ^ Clarksburg Exponent-Telegram (Clarksburg, West Virginia), December 16, 2012: C5.[1]
  11. ^ Clarksburg Exponent-Telegram (Clarksburg, West Virginia), October 17, 2021: C7.[2]
  12. ^ Cause IQ
  13. ^ Appalachian Springs Foundation Statement
  14. ^ https://dbryantmusic.com/third-thursdays/
  15. ^ Jazz Critics Poll 2015
  16. ^ Jazz Critics Poll 2020
  17. ^ a b Sounds and Visions Festival
  18. ^ Clara Gibson Maxwell, "A Conversation with Paris Ballet Master Wayne Byars", ExChange: The Journal of Alexander Technique International, 17:2 (Spring 2009): 22-27.[3]
  19. ^ Clara Gibson Maxwell, Dancing Tudor's Cereus, Zen Notes, 28:10 (October 1981): 6 [4]
  20. ^ Castoriadis and Maxwell at Cerisy Colloquium, 1990
  21. ^ Coleman and Maxwell during a studio rehearsal in New York City, 1991
  22. ^ J.C. Lockwood, "Clara Gibson Maxwell: A Philosophy of Dance", Merrimack Valley Sunday, September 29, 1996, p. 16
  23. ^ Frederick, Michael J., Notes from Concord. The Thoreau Society Bulletin, no. 313 (2021): 12–13. "Notes from Concord". Retrieved 19 March 2024.
  24. ^ a b c "Montclair Local Nonprofit News, July 11, 2021". Retrieved 20 March 2024.
  25. ^ The Banquet at Taliesin West video trailer
  26. ^ "2000s FLlW School of Architecture Faculty". Retrieved 22 March 2024.

External links[edit]

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