Anna Halprin's Movement of Life Published by Contredanse

Éditions Contredanse has published 'Anna Halprin, Mouvements de vie', a comprehensive collection of writings, scores, working documents, interviews, and photographs spanning 60 years of the dancer-choreographer's research, creations, and transformations through dance. Translated from English and including a new postface and interview, the book details Halprin's methods and artistic evolution at the intersection of anthropology, therapy, pedagogy, and sociology. Strongly influenced by Gestalt therapy, Halprin approached dance through internal movement functioning (kinesiology) and created 'tasks'—structured frameworks for improvisation where individual contributions fit into an ordered collective, with performance evaluation moments. The book draws parallels between Halprin's California dance experiments and Richard Schechner's theatrical experiments in New York, particularly the creation of laboratories: the Wooster Group, San Francisco Dancer's Workshop, and Tamalpa Institute. An interview between Halprin and Schechner reveals disagreements on the transformative power of rituals. Halprin's emancipatory work, where movement consciousness leads to a 'more alive life', calls for a form of belief.