From Wool Tube to Bias Skirt

Abstract Chapter 2 focuses on the semi-circular skirt used as a dramatic costume in Martha Graham’s modern dance company. It begins with the stretch tubular form of her Lamentation costume to argue that it involved a sculptural approach, inspired by Isamu Noguchi and photography, toward the formal shaping of “the hidden body” in choreography. The malleable qualities of wool made it ideal for a new mobility in dance, and it compares Graham’s experimental uses of wool jersey with the bias cut that became central to the “new look” in modern fashion. The woolen skirt amplifies the folding, torsion, and rocking in Graham’s powerful choreographic forms that celebrate passionate feminine figures. The chapter considers how the remains of her “repertoire” are affected by the legacy of dance costumes that were modified or destroyed by weather events and circumstance.