Rudolf and Joan Benesh Rudolf
was born in London of a Czech father and an Anglo-Italian mother.
A qualified accountant, Rudolf , who was always fascinated by the
arts and sciences, also studied fine art at Wimbledon College It was thorough his painting that he met Joan, the catalyst and inspiration for his invention of Benesh Movement Notation. ‘During
a rest break, while I was painting her portrait, I mused at her struggle
to get down on paper her choreographic ideas.’ Beginning
in 1947, there followed eight years of collaborative development
(including marriage in 1949) leading to the first public presentation
of the notation at the Royal Opera House in September 1955. This
was shortly followed by the publication of An Introduction to
Benesh Dance Notation, inclusion of the notation amongst the
British Government Pavilion exhibits of technological and scientific
discovery at the 1958 Brussels Universal Exhibition, the launch of
a correspondence course, the development of teaching syllabi, and
in 1960, the Royal Ballet Company employing Faith Worth as the first
professional dance company notator. In 1962 The Benesh Institute of Choreology was founded with Sir Frederick Ashton as President, Arnold Haskell as Vice-President and Nicholas Dromgoole as Chairman of the Board of Governors. In 1965, with funding from the Gulbenkian Foundation, the Leverhulme Trust and the Pilgrim Trust, The Institute acquired premises in London in which to house its growing library of scores and its first full-time training course. Some of the first graduates joined Joan (Principal of the Training Course), building a team of teachers and researchers exploring use of the notation in a variety of applications: Modern Dance (Janet Wilks), East Asian Classical Dance (Marianne Balchin), Folk and National Dance (Robert Harold), Character Dance (Melvina Bura), Historical Dance (Wendy Hilton, Belinda Quirey), choreographic analysis (Kathleen Russell), work study and medicine (Francis Green and later Julia McGuiness Scott), with Rudolf, as Director of the Institute, ensuring compatibility, economy and conceptual rigor to each new development. ‘His
thinking was always original. It was as if instead of standing in
front of an idea looking at it as everyone did, he walked around
it and approached it from a different angle’ In 1973 Highdown Tower, the Institute’s residential Training Centre, in the Sussex countryside was opened. Conceived along the lines of a three-year university degree programme, the education offered was well ahead of its time incorporating a wide range of dance and movement study options in tandem with, and enhanced by the study of Benesh Movement Notation. Shortly after this Rudolf was diagnosed with cancer and died in May 1975.
Joan (nee Rothwell) was born in Liverpool in 1920. Her vocational education included a period at the Studio School of Dance and Drama and she later studied ballet with Lydia Sokolova. During the war she danced in the commercial theatre. In 1950 she joined the Royal Opera Company and the following year the Sadlers Wells Ballet Company (now the Royal Ballet). In 1957 she joined the staff of the Royal Ballet School, White Lodge, before founding the Institute’s training course in 1963. She retired as Principal in July 1976. ‘In 1975 Rudolf Benesh was tragically struck down with cancer and his death robbed the dance world of one of its greatest innovators. In his quiet, diffident way he had a gift for stimulating the thinking of those around him, and arousing their loyalty and affection. He had too that rare gift for sharing and engendering enthusiasm in his subject, which is the mark of a born teacher. Joan Benesh matched his gifts at every point. Positive, determined, and tenacious in what she believed to be right, she too aroused loyalty and warmth in her pupils and associates. Together they made a formidable team, ensuring the acceptance and growth of notation in the crucial and difficult early years, which any new invention must inevitably go through before it is widely accepted. After Rudolf Benesh’s death, Joan Benesh retired from active direction of the Institute, but has remained its adviser, always ready to devote time and energy to the needs of notation. Of them it can truly be said, that they left the dance world a changed place. Not only did they change it, they changed it for the better.’ Nicholas
Dromgoole: Chairman of the Benesh Institute 1968 - 1986.
Benesh, R and J, (1969) An Introduction to Benesh Movement Notation: Dance, Dance Horizons Incorporated, New York Benesh, R and J, (1977) Reading Dance: The Birth of Choreology, Souvenir Press, London Benesh,
R. (1970) Birth of a Language, The Benesh Institute, London |
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of
Art and music at Morley College.