Pueblo chieftain., 1921-05-07
By Frederic ]. Haskit.

Washington. D. c., May 4.-"The
Dance of the Machine Gum was re-
Gently enacted by a young man at a
local amateur performance before a
highly edited audience. In this ar
tistic effort the young man took some
thing distinctly modern and tried to
interpret the emotions which it would
arouse in a sensitive beholder. just as
the early Greeks, the early Egyptians,
the American Indians and many other
ancient and primitive peoples have in
terpreted the familiar and striking
features of their lives in dance.
Opinion was divided as to the merits
of the young mans performance. 1t
was in fact rated all the way from the
sublime to the ridiculous. But it had
to be conceded that he was an artistic
pioneer of a high order. Ever since
certain statge stars popularized inter
pretive dancing in this country some
years ago, the vogue of it as an art
has been spreading. There are schools
of interpretive dancing in nearly all
of our cities. Plump ladies dance to
get thin and thin ladies dance to get
fat. and all of them dance, of course.
to express their souls. In addition to
ageous band of male dancers. These
are tho real martyrs of the cahse, for,
altho among most primitive peoples
dancing has been more a male than Il
female art, altho David in the Bible
danced for the Glory of Jehovah in the
face of his wife's disapproval, solo
dancing has now come to be regarded
as primarily a feminine art. Social
dancing by couples, of course, is an
entirely different thing, being a form
of communal courting, and a lineal de-
scendant of the social orgies of saw
age tribes, and not an artistic effort
at all.
But the important point is that this
brave young man of the machine gun
dance was trying to invent an Ameri-
can and modern interpretive dance.
and so get away from the initiative
character of all our dances. Just as
our architecture in this country Is
GrotesQue mixture of Greek, Gothic,
English. and Italian with dabs of ORR
entail so our interpretive dancing has
been initiative of Greek. Egyptian, and
Hindoo efforts. In neither is there
anything original, anything ''onc hun
dred per cent American. Now our
literature just recently is showing
strong signs of indigenous originality,
and our architecture. dancing and other
arts should be able to follow suit.
Some Possible Themes
II the young mans mechanical no.
ton was followed out, we should have
likewise tho dance of the steam drill.
tho dance of the steam shovel. and
above all the dance of the steam roll
Ter, which would afford special oppor-
tunities for the heavy talent which is
SO abundant in dancing circles. But
the new American school OF dance
should express the soul of the great
American people rather than the mere
mechanical cNtcrnals of its industrial
technology. For example, opposed to
the famous bacchanal of the ancient
Romans we should have the probition
dance. Tho Imagination fairly riots
with possible details. Likewise the
dance OF tho blue laws would surely
bo one of our masterpieces, cmhodying
tho very soul of our traditional puri-
tanism. Imagine also dances which
interpreted tho spirit Of a great Amer
lean amusement park. and thing OF
tho effects which could be wrought in
n dance OF election night. or dance
of tho Red Peril.
Does 1T strike you as ridiculous? 1t
is by Just such interpretations OF their
national and racial life that the an
cicnt raised the dance to a plane of
equality with music and painting as