25 Facts About James Waring

James Waring was a dancer, choreographer, costume designer, theatre director, playwright, poet, and visual artist, based in New York City from 1949 until his death in 1975.

James Waring's training began in 1939 in San Francisco and Oakland at the age of 17.

James Waring was exposed to numerous kinds of dancing, including ballet at the San Francisco Ballet School with Harold Christensen and his brother, the Graham technique with Gertrude Schurr, and the interpretive dance of Raoul Pause.

In 1946, James Waring presented the first of the over 135 original works he would create over the course of his career, "Luther Burbank in Santa Rosa", at the Halprin-Lathrop Studio Theater.

James Waring was among a group of choreographers and dancers in New York who, in 1951, created Dance Associates, a co-operative which included Aileen Passloff, Tanaquil Le Clercq from the New York City Ballet, Marian Sarach, Paul Taylor, David Vaughn, dance writer Edward Denby, actor Alix Rubin and others.

In 1954, James Waring began presenting works with his own company in annual concerts, continuing to do so until 1969.

James Waring disbanded his company in 1975, shortly before his death, but, in 1974, his male dancers formed Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, a travesty dance ensemble in which the men perform as ballerinas.

Notable among James Waring's works were Phrases, Dances before the Wall, Dromenon, Variations on a Landscape, Sinfonia semplice, and Amoretti.

Later dancers who would go on to found the Judson Dance Theater and create postmodern dance studied with James Waring or danced in his company, including Lucinda Childs, David Gordon, Sally Gross, Deborah Hay, Fred Herko, Gretchen MacLane, Michael Mao, Meredith Monk, Yvonne Rainer, and Valda Setterfield.

James Waring worked at various times with Julian Beck, George Brecht, Red Grooms, Al Hansen, Robert Indiana, Jasper Johns, Larry Poons, Robert Watts, Robert Whitman, and John Wulp.

Some artists were involved in the creation of "Happenings", which were free-form inter-disciplinary multi-media events, each one unique, and James Waring encouraged this new form; he aided Allen Kaprow in putting on one of his first ones.

James Waring organized events such as the Pocket Follies benefit in 1963 at the Pocket Theater, which featured many dancers associated with James Waring as well as George Brecht, Jill Johnston, and Robert Rauschenberg, and two months of weekly "Events and Entertainments" at the same venue in 1964.

James Waring wrote poetry, plays, essays and dance criticism, and was one of the founders in 1961 of the New York Poets Theatre, known as the American Theater for Poets; his plays were presented there and at the Judson Poets Theater.

James Waring directed plays by other writers at the Living Theatre and at the Judson.

James Waring worked with Frank O'Hara, Maria Irene Fornes, Diane Di Prima, Robert Duncan, Paul Goodman, Alan Marlowe and Kenneth Koch, among other poets and writers.

James Waring makes a brief appearance in Andy Warhol's 1963 film Haircut No 1, shot in a huge warehouse with a single spotlight, for which 600 feet of film were exposed, six 100 feet rolls, each showing the haircutting from a different angle.

James Waring died from a malignant tumor in Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan on December 2,1975, at the age of 53.

James Waring did not want his dancers to act or emote, as this was conventionally understood.

James Waring abandoned narrative and dramatic structure in the mid-1950s, creating atmospheres referring lovingly and archly to variety dancing and ballet, and mixing musical as well as dancing styles.

James Waring was a gentle humorist, sometimes parodying other dance genres, often close to camp.

Choreographer David Gordon, who first danced professionally in James Waring's company, describes James Waring's process:.

Jimmy [James Waring] was an education for me, as he was for most people who came in contact with him.

James Waring could pull the silk purse out of the sow's ear.

James Waring used what I had and demanded more than I thought I had, and his instincts were usually right.

In making dance, in teaching technique and composition, in writing and conversation, James Waring asked many questions.