Seven Days: Vermont's Independent Voice

Perpetual Motion

In 1957’s Seven New Dances, Paul Taylor and another dancer stood still onstage for four long minutes. Critics were baffled and enraged; Dance Observer’s Louis Horst responded by running four square inches of empty space as his review. It’s not easy being a forerunner of American modern dance. Taylor hasn’t quite ditched his reputation as the “naughty boy” of dance, as fellow dancer/choreographer Martha Graham called him, but the octogenarian garners considerably more acclaim for his groundbreaking work these days. At the Flynn, the Paul Taylor Dance Company revisits Aureole (1962), Esplanade (1975), Troilus and Cressida (reduced) (2006) and Beloved Renegade (2008).