1965: Parades & Changes, the first-ever collective creation to be named as such by Anna Halprin, was the result of experimentation that she had undertaken since the late 1940s on performance and improvisation.

This major piece of work focuses on the banality of everyday gestures such as getting dressed or getting undressed. The performance ends with the dancers wrapped in a gigantic sheet of flesh-coloured paper that gets crumbled and torn in total silence. This staging of nudity led to the show being banned in the United States for twenty years. Created in partnership with the composer, Morton Subotnick, the composition of this work is based on a complex score that provides its structure with total flexibility, and offers artists from several disciplines the opportunity to work hand-in-hand. 2008: As regards Parades & Changes, Replays, Anne Collod initiated collaboration with Anna Halprin and Morton Subotnick, the composer and co-creator of the 1965 work. Two other choreographers, Alain Buffard and Boaz Barkan, who had participated in the American choreographer's work for many years and who know her work extremely well, joined the trio, along with Boris Charmatz, Vera Mantero and DD Dorvillier. Each of them was eager to experience the work of Anna Halprin and her latest developments.

“The question: “What opportunities for togetherness does dance invent?” is one of those that have been guiding my creative and research work for several years. It was this question that led me to meet Anna Halprin, an extraordinary woman, a pioneering choreographer whose work provides the answers for a humanity burning with this wondering. It was also the catalyst for the project that we are talking about here, and furthered my desire to work specifically on this piece from 1965, which shattered the codes that existed in dance and its performance at that time: parades & changes. What effects can be produced when the multiple scenarios of this piece of work are put back into play, in another period of time and in other places, by actors of today who are directly concerned by the issues that touch the contemporary world? How can we create the conditions so that the exchange between Anna Halprin and a new generation of dancers and choreographers will be fruitful? A myriad of challenges at the heart of the parades & changes, replays project.”

Sources : Anne Collod, Biennale de la danse 2008 press book

Since the late 1930s Anna Halprin has been creating revolutionary directions for dance, inspiring artists in all fields. Through her students Trisha Brown, Yvonne Rainer, and Simone Forti, Anna strongly influenced New York’s Judson Dance Theater, one of the seedbeds of postmodern dance. Defying traditional notions of dance, Anna has extended its boundaries to address social issues, build community, foster both physical and emotional healing, and connect people to nature. In response to the racial unrest of the 1960s, she brought together a group of all-black and a group of all-white dancers in a collaborative performance, Ceremony of Us. She then formed the first multiracial dance company and increasingly focused on social justice themes. When she was diagnosed with cancer in the early 1970s, she used dance as part of her healing process and subsequently created innovative dance programs for cancer and AIDS patients.

With her husband, the landscape architect Lawrence Halprin, Anna developed methods of generating collective creativity. During the late 1960s and early 70s, they led a series of workshops called “Experiments in the Environment,” bringing dancers, architects, and other artists together and exploring group creativity in relation to awareness of the environment, in both rural and urban settings. Increasingly, Anna’s performances moved out of the theater and into the community, helping people address social and emotional concerns.

Over her long career Anna has created more than 150 dance theater works and written three books. Many of her dances have grown out of her life experiences. After her husband faced a life-threatening crisis, for instance, she developed the performance Intensive Care: Reflections on Death and Dying (2000). Facing her own aging, she worked with older people in her community to evolve "Seniors Rocking" (2005), performed by over 50 elders outdoors in rocking chairs. To honor the memory of her husband, she created a trilogy, including "Spirit of Place", a site-specific work in an outdoor theater space he had designed (performed in 2009, shortly before his death). In 2013 she revisited her groundbreaking "Parades and Changes" (1965), retaining its essence but adding new sections to heighten its relevance for today’s world.

On May 24, 2021 Anna Halprin passed away peacefully at her home in Kentfield, CA. She was 100 years old.

Source: Anna Halprin 's website

More information :

annahalprin.org