Isadora Duncan refused to be filmed while she danced. The most eager prophet of modern bodily movement avoided the great new vessel of the truth a motion - unwilling, it would seem, to do without the audience rapport that was indispensable to her success. Her reluctance went with her noticeably religious attitude toward her own dancing, and toward art in general. She found she rather liked going to the pictures, but the entertaining movie-camera was certainly not the thing to register the sacred communion between Isadora, her muse and her followers. That, rather, was for fellow artists to attempt.

LRB 10 March 1994 | PDF Download