The art of dance is an art form that uses refined human movement as the main means of expression, and utilizes a variety of basic elements, such as dance language, rhythm, expression and composition, to create an intuitive and dynamic dance image that expresses people's thoughts and feelings. Dance can be divided into life dance and art dance.
Dance is an art of human movement. However, the human body movement, must be refined, organized and beautified human body movement - dance human body movement. In addition, belonging to the category of human movement art also has many kinds, such as acrobatics, mime, human sculpture, rhythmic gymnastics and so on. Therefore, dance is different from other human movement art is the main aspect: it is to dance movement as the main means of artistic expression, focusing on the expression of language and text or other means of artistic expression is difficult to express people's inner deep spiritual world - delicate emotions, profound ideas, distinctive character, and man and nature, man and society, man and man and the conflict between people and the people themselves, to create a vivid dance image that can be perceived by the people. To create a vivid dance image that can be perceived by people, in order to express the aesthetic feelings and ideals of the dance authors (choreographers and dancers), and to reflect the aesthetic attributes of life. In addition, due to the human body movements without stopping the flow of the characteristics of change, it must be in a certain space (stage or square) and a certain amount of time; and in the dance activities, generally have to be accompanied by music, to wear a specific costume, some dances but also to hold a variety of props, if it is performed on the stage, the lights and scenery is also indispensable. Therefore, it can also be said that dance is a kind of spatial, temporal and comprehensive dynamic modeling art. In the eyes of philosophers and aesthetes, the art of dance has been elevated to a kind of life, even the art of life. In the ancient social life, there is almost nothing more important than the dance - marriage, funeral, childbearing and sacrifice, sowing and harvesting, driving away diseases and evil spirits, all of which are inseparable from the dance. Dance became a simple way of life and a means of perceiving the world for ancient peoples. In the north of New Caledonia, traders in market stores took turns to come out and dance in order to display their wares; the inhabitants of North Queensland danced a festive ring dance to catch lice one by one; and the chiefs of Cameroon, Africa, even sang and danced their way to the execution ground when they were sentenced to death for treachery. The dance of modern society is a shrinking relative to the dance of antiquity. So remembering the journey of this mother of arts becomes a trek to trace the passion of life and revitalize the culture of the human body. The German-Jewish scholar Kurt Sachs The German-Jewish scholar Kurt Sachs has historically categorized the world's dances into the Stone Age, the Upper Paleolithic, the Middle Paleolithic, the Waltz of the 18th and 19th centuries, the Polka, and the Tango of the 20th century. In Dance Morphology (by Yu Ping), the cultural pattern of traditional dance in the whole world establishes eight cultural circles - the Chinese Dance Culture Circle, the Indo-Malay Dance Culture Circle, the Indian Dance Culture Circle, the Malay-Polynesian Dance Culture Circle, the Arab Dance Culture Circle, the Latin American Mixed Dance Culture Circle, the Black African Dance Culture Circle, and the European Dance Culture Circle.
Edited Origins
According to art historians, the earliest art produced by mankind was dance. Before ancient mankind has not yet produced language, people use movement, gesture expression to convey a variety of information and the exchange of emotions and ideas. According to the myths and legends of ancient China and ancient Greece, human beings learned to dance from the emperor of heaven, or they were inspired by the goddess in charge of dance to create dance. We know that the ancient ancestors did not understand the concept of God and man as clearly as modern people do. At that time, people often regarded people with extraordinary talents, people with wisdom and power beyond the average, or people who made great contributions to mankind as the incarnation of gods or people who could communicate with the gods. Now, we know that all kinds of gods are created by human beings through imagination based on their own images. It is the gods who created the dance, and in the final analysis, it is we humans who created the dance.
Types
Art is made up of different varieties of art. Dance, as one of the arts, is also a very wide world, and it is also composed of different kinds, styles, and manners of dance. According to the function and purpose of dance, dance can be divided into two categories: life dance and art dance. Life dance is a dance activity that people perform for their own life needs; artistic dance is a dance that is performed for the audience to enjoy. Life dance includes: customary dance, religious ritual dance, social dance, self-entertainment dance, sports dance, educational dance and so on.
Editorial Artistic Characteristics
Rhythmicity
Penetrating the tangible shell of dance, drilling into it, going in and out, there may be a long, deep, deep staircase, and when you feel that you are gradually approaching the bottom, you must have already been transformed into nothing. You are also nothing, the long step is also nothing, and only its nothing, seems to be more omnipresent. When you can't find the bottom of the longest step and you can't find yourself at the same time, you both become omnipresent, but you can never explain, can't explain, don't exist to explain, don't explain, the kind of tremor that only originates from and is with the spirituality of human life. It is weak, it is strong, it is soft, it is firm, it is relaxed, it is open, it is astringent, it is fluid. It is rhythm. Rhythm is the soul of dance. From the inside out, especially can visualize this true meaning. Rhythm, the original restlessness of life to give rhythmic order, so that it turns into a mood, can be presented like a fire. Rhythmic movement is, at its core, a form of force. Rhythmic power style changes richly, the most direct and significant expression of the dancer's temperament, sentiment, a thousand rhythms.
Dynamism
One of the most basic characteristics of dance art is dynamism. The so-called dynamics, refers to the dance to the human body's torso and limbs to do. The main tool, and through a variety of action gestures and modeling to image to reflect the objective things and characters of the spiritual world, shaping the image of dance. This kind of human body's rhythmic and embellished movement is not a general action pile and list, but as a kind of figurative dance language presented in front of people's eyes. The image thinking and artistic conception of the dance creators are mainly fully realized through these dynamic languages, and create distinctive and vivid dance images. Therefore, some people also call it the art of movement.
Strong lyricism
Dance is the most concentrated and exciting expression of human feelings. Human physical movements can express the most excited state of mind and rich inner feelings. The poet Wen Yiduo said, "Dance is the most direct, poignant, pure and ample expression of the mood of life." We know from ancient artifacts and historical data that the state and form of dance of primitive people were mainly to express their inner passions and manifest the infinite vitality of life. This characteristic of dance fully reflects its strong lyricism.
Virtual, symbolic
Another difference between dance and other performing arts is virtual and symbolic. In terms of the opera, which embraces the classical dance of China's Han people, its dance movements such as riding a horse, rowing a boat, sitting in a sedan chair, embroidering, raising a whip, and so on, are all virtual and symbolic. As a matter of fact, the horses, boats, sedan chairs, needles and so on in the dance are all virtual, only a horse whip, a boat oar and so on are used for symbolic gestures, but such hypothetical dance movements are recognized and accepted by the audience. In the representation of the environment, there is neither a model of the mountain nor a river set, but the hands gesture to climb, to the high leg to climb, but people believe that this is in the mountain; the audience is convinced that a series of big jumps, spinning and tumbling movement is in the performance of the battle, convinced that this is the smoke-filled battlefield.
Modeling
Dance movement is not a simulation of the natural form of life, but the basic unit of dance language which is refined, processed and beautified according to the law of dance art. The dance language, a combination of dance movements, passes by in an instant in front of people's eyes, and if it fails to leave an impression on the audience, it is impossible to realize the charm and function of dance art. The stylization of dance is to let the dance movement give people a clear sense of beauty in the process of continuous flow, and to present the inner meaning and flavor of the dance in a moment of pause and stillness. Stylization is characterized by movement with stillness, stillness with movement, movement and stillness in order, both of which are beautiful. It can fully display the beauty of human body lines and movements, and concentrate on reflecting the inner look.
Editing the means of expression
The dance uses the human body's torso and limbs as tools, and through the coordinated activities of the head, eyes, neck, hands, wrists, elbows, arms, shoulders, body, hips, knees, feet, and other parts of the body, it constitutes rhythmic dance movements, gestures, and modeling, which directly expresses people's inner activities and reflects the life of the society. While the performing art of dance to dance movements, dance movement combinations, modeling, gestures, facial expressions, composition, mime and other means of expression, shaping the typical dance image, expressing the thoughts and feelings of the characters, reflecting the complete beauty of the content and the beauty of the form.