Basic characteristics
(1) Modern dance's concept of life is tolerant, optimistic and easy-going; its concept of art is to seek common ground while reserving differences, and "the eight immortals cross the sea, each showing their own skills". Merce Kannenhan, the third generation master of American modern dance, once said, "If you don't like other people's works, then make up a good one that you like."
(2) The concept of volume comes first in modern dance. Graham's crown of "greatness" is supposedly constructed from an unrivaled 180 choreographies and dances. Her fellow students have also pointed out: "Do you want to make a great dance? Well, choreograph 100 bad ones before you do!"
(3) The concept of beauty has long been the only pursuit in modern dance; and in modern aesthetics, beauty is even less of a supreme concept. Therefore, beauty or lack of beauty should not be the only yardstick to measure the level of modern dance works; when Graeme first appeared on the scene, her jerky movements with edges and corners, and even more sensitivity to the upcoming new era, were insulted by the press at the time as "either epileptic seizures, or imminent childbirth". But decades later, when the whole world was using her spasmodic expressions, the principle of her "contraction-relaxation" was taken as the rallying cry of a new era and the representative of a new aesthetic.
(4) The concepts of new and old are not absolute rights and wrongs in modern dance. Although the new is not necessarily always better than the old, the new is every time more interesting and evocative than the old.
(5) One should do one's best to avoid judging right and wrong in modern dance works, especially when looking at post-modern dance that is far from traditional concepts. Dance is an aesthetic, not an ethic, at a distance from economic foundations and ideologies.
(6) It is best not to make judgments about the value of modern dance works, especially the kind of new works, including student's work, that are experimental, but rather to make every effort to explore the potential of their creativity and to understand the motivation for their creation as the fundamental aim.
(7) All choreographic creations, in the final analysis, are consciously or unconsciously exploring the philosophical and aesthetic proposition, "What is dance?" Such a philosophical and aesthetic proposition.
(8) The serious problem of danceability in classical dance does not hold true in modern dance, because the concept of modern dance is so broad, because nature is not dancing in the eyes of modern dancers, and because every behavior and every movement of human beings is not dancing. Paul Taylor, the third-generation master of modern dance in the United States, said, "It is not the movements we lack, but the eyes that find those movements that serve their purpose excellently."
(9) Thoughtfulness and philosophizing have always been one of the key characteristics of modern dancers. And no longer are they the kind of artists and craftsmen who only imitate without thinking about creating.
(10) It is necessary to find out that modern dance is all about bold experimentation and serious exploration, not about cheap pleasing or technical showmanship.