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Paul Taylor was born July 29, 1930 in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania, but grew up in Washington, DC. He went to Syracuse University in 1947 with a painting and swimming scholarship, but he didn’t beginning dancing till 1951 when he then transferred to Julliard. Along with Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey, and José Limón, Paul studied modern dancing and got into ballet with Antony Tudor and Margaret Craske. In 1953, he began his professional career in Martha Graham’s company, creating important roles as Aegisthus in Clytemnestra (1958), Hercules in Alcestis (1960), and Theseus in Phaedra (1962). He also performed in others, including those of Charles Weidman and Merce Cunningham. Paul Taylor even did a solo that was made specifically for him by George Balanchine called Episodes in 1959.
In 1954, Taylor established his own company usually having at most 13 dancers. They first performed in Europe in 1960, toured South America in 1965, toured the U.S.S.R in 1978 and also made an appearance in the U.S public-television network. Since Taylor was a choreographer he used a lot of different movement styles such as flat which he described as a two-dimensional appearance, dance scribbling said to emphasis on an action rather than on a shape or line, and lyric described as long arms. He has created several works such as Duet in 1957, in which he and his partner remained motionless for four minutes, and Orbs in 1966 which was an hour-long composition to Beethoven’s last string quartets. He has done several other well-known works like Three Epitaphs (1956), Aureole (1962), Scudorama (1963), The Book of Beasts (1971), Esplanade and Runes (1975), Cloven Kingdom (1976), Aphrodisiamania (1977), Airs (1978), Nightshade (1979), and Le Sacre du Printemps (1980). In 1974 [continues]

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