Jose Limon Essay

“We are never more truly and profoundly human than when we dance.” Jose Arcadio Limon was a dancer and choreographer born and raised in Mexico. He was inspired to begin his studies in modern dance when he saw a performance of Harald Krutzberg and Yvone Georgi. Limon enrolled at the dance school of Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman. He continued to work with Humphrey until 1946, when he founded the José Limón Dance Company. His most successful work is called The Moor's Pavane and it is based on Shakespeare's Othello. The Limón Dance Company still exists and is part of the Jose Limon Dance Foundation, an institution dedicated to preserve and disseminate his artistic dance work and technique. Jose Limon is important in the American Dance History

because he is one of the choreographers of modern dance that has best merged with dance music.

Limón left to the world of dance a wide range of choreography and dance technique. His choreographic language is distinguished by his passion, expression of human emotions, spontaneity, and musicality. He had a great ability to express a dance in its purest essence, without gestures or unnecessary movements. His technique is one of the most preserved in America and you can find almost in every city a place where it is taught.

Jose Arcadio Limon born in Culiacan Sinaloa, Mexico in 1908. He was the oldest of eleven brothers. His father, Florencio Limon, who was an orchestra conductor and the director of La Academia de Musica de Sonora, taught Jose to play instruments such as the organ. Francisca Translavina, Jose’s mother, was a Yaqui Indian descendant. Limon was born in a very difficult time for Mexico; the Mexican Revolution began and the city where he was born, fell into great economic problems. The Mexican Revolution was a major armed

struggle that radically changed politics and Mexican society. The origins of the conflict were broadly based in opposition to Díaz 35 year’s regime, but the 1910 election became the sparking point for the outbreak of a political rebellion. “But our world, our Hispanic world, was falling apart. My father, the exact antithesis of the warrior, was appalled and disgusted by the era’s violence and lawlessness (14).” La Academia de Musica de Sonora, like many other institutions, disappeared. His father began to serve as the director of military bands of the generals: Alvaro Obregon and Plutarco Elias Calles. What his father saw and experienced working there, led Limon’s family immigrate to the United States and established in Los Angeles, California. He was often bullied because of his Mexican accent. His memoir states, “My accent may have been ridiculed, but my prowess as an artist was accepted with total and gratifying admiration (15).” His early interests were in music and painting. At twenty years old, he moved to New York. He intended to study art at the New York School of Design. But, his intentions changed when he attended a dance performance of German dancers Harald Kreutzberg and Yvonne Goergi. Inspired by this presentation, Limon decided to study modern dance.
In 1929, Limon enrolled at the dance school of Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman. He shortly became one of the most popular dancers at the Humphrey-Weidman company. His memoir states, “Doris and Charles were, each in their own way, artistic genius”. Doris Humphrey was a dancer and choreographer who explored the distinctions of the human body’s responses to gravity, come to life in her principle “fall and recovery” or how she called “the arch between two deaths”. She met Charles Weidman at Denishawn Company to later be dance partners and co-founders of Humphrey-Weidman Company. From the 30’s, Jose also worked as a dancer on Broadway in different dance works from choreographers such as Humphrey, Weidman, George Balanchine and May O’Donnell. Also in that decade, Limon began to create his own choreographic work. In 1939, he presented Danzas Mexicanas. It is considered his first successful choreographic work. A year later, Limón left the Humphrey-Weidman Company to begin a solo career as choreographer and dancer. He also continued to perform with the dancer May O'Donnell. In October of that year, he married Pauline Lawrence, whom he had first met when she was an employee at Humphrey-Weideman.