Trisha Brown Company has announced that its founder, the American choreographer, dancer and artist Trisha Brown, has died. Brown was a pioneer figure who was instrumental in shaping the contemporary dance landscape in New York and internationally, constantly pushing beyond the convention of dance through numerous artistic collaborations, and finding inspiration in the movement and gestures of the everyday life. Brown founded her dance company in 1970, where she relentlessly pursued her investigation and experimentation with the medium for over 40 years. During this time, she created 100 choreographies, six operas, as well as drawings which where widely exhibited in museums. Among her notable artistic collaborations, Brown worked with Robert Rauschenberg who created the set and costumes for Set and Reset (1983), Donald Judd on Son of Gone Fishin’ (1981)and Newark (Niweweorce) (1987) and with Latvian-born, New York-based Vija Celmins who designed the set for her 2004 O zlozony/O composite.
Brown has received countless awards and grants throughout her career, including the MacArthur ‘Genius’ Grant in 1991, five fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and two John Simon Guggenheim Fellowships; she was named Commandeur dans l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres by the French government in 2004, served on the National Council on the Arts from 1994 to 1997 (at the invitation of President Bill Clinton) and in 2011, received the prestigious Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize for making an ‘outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind’s enjoyment and understanding of life’ – to name but a few.
21 March 2017
