Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 29, 1915)
The Omaha bit " X 1 K Mile. Ymelda Juliewna Developing with Her Own Body an Idea for a Sculptured Figure, for Which an Appearance of Equi librium It an Important Problem. A Russian Artist's Odd Theory That Perfect Control of Your Body's Gravity in All Sorts of Poses Gives You Better Command of AH Your N'rte art world. v'.:elaetrbere. not- only : too term . "Efficiency," but "Al Efficiency," it . oetos practised as well as preached. Young' painters and aculptors, students of tbe . great classics which depict the human face and form as Influenced by dif ferent emotions and physical effort, are no longer satisfied merely to create graphic or plastic representa tions of these moods and actions; they are teaching their own counte nances and bodies to.conyey, first, the ideas which they wish to depict with brush or chisel. This is a novel illustration or "Al Efficiency" applied to art The prin ciple involved Is stimulation of the creative Impulse through gaining ab solute command of their own boules and means of physical expression, resulting In perfect co-ordination of all the mental and physical faculties. It will be seen that the principle ap plies almost equally to any vocation ; so anybody's efficiency to Ufa will be Improved by dancing. ' Thus a young Russian girl with German family connections, studying sculpture In Munich, has become such an exceptionally capable dancer on the classic Greek lines of that firt that she has created a furor In xhe art and general society of the Bavarian capital. Although her pro ductions as a sculptor have not yet won the critics entirely, her purely incidental ability as a performer of classic dances has spread her name and her fame throughout Germany. . She is Ymelda Juliewna, and the photographs reproduced on this page speak for her beauty and intelli gence no less than for the grace with which she adorns her dancing and posing Imitations and creations. When she Imitates the sculptured "Dying Gladiator" her sculptor's "mind's eye" la fortified by the sen sations in nerves and muscles of her own body this muscle is contracted Just so, this other muscle flexed, nec essarily, and so on. She becomes the "Dying Gladiator," and will know better than before how to represent him on canvas or in marble. Everything we know and feel Is learned by us through the medium of our five senses. Our five senses re all purely nerve and muscle ac tions and reactions. All emotion is a complex of muscular and nerve phenomena. Just as a body In which all the muscles, nrves. etc., are In harmony in a healthy body, so the peculiar complex of muscular and nervous activity that we know as emotion will be pleasant and happy if it is harmonious. A carpenter to be Al efficient In his trade Is one In whom every mus cular action and reaction is perfectly timed to the result be desires to ac complish. So of all other trades. Al efficiency In lire is dependent upon exactly the same thing. In no other way than dancing of a particular kind can this peculiarly subtle muscular harmony be gained. Rythmic movements that counterfeit and emphasize and develop well known gestures of grief enable one to build up a resistance against sor row. Sorrow that causes people to commit suicide or to become 111 and normal is simply a case of mus rnmr Ineptitude. It Is exactly like a man who has not beea trained to wrestle trying to keep from being thrown by a trained wrestler. But If one in a series of well-thought-of dances counterfeits, all these expres sions of grief, when xriet finally does come it finds a muscular harmony development along the lines of Dsmigd Oms&hes Into f I Faculties to Meet AU Emotional '.. , , , . , Emergencief H -r C'Stcf ;; N. V j A Dancing 4r T ' jf VVV ( Deiigned to " I ' XxV Give Control UP V V of the ;J ( I I ZlB s V:i MInd ij jlS; j iVif v u I Through i ff I Jv - r f 1 V I the Body'. Gravity, ; "Despair," a Dancing Exercise by Mile. Juliewna Deiigned to "Teach One Better to Bear Grief." grief that prevents the mind from be ing ovetbrown. in tii saute way, if what we know as magnetism (which everyone craves as a thing which brings us friends and fortune) is to be developed, then a series of dancing poses which will imitate Joy, the pleasure of receiving great gifts, love, and so on, create a peculiarly subtle muscular strength which attracts Just these things we want. The stenographer is able to take down dictation quicker and mora accurately and to read her notes more quickly and more accurately if she each morning devotes half an hour to a dance which calls for ex traordinary balance and quickness of motion. The lawyer and the Judge are able to decide knotty points of law better if they have become tuned up in the morning by a half hour of slow, graceful, logical, linked movements. Anyone is better able to meet the emergency of life if for a half hour or an hour every morning he or she will dance through poses which brine out perfect control of the gravity of LhndbhA5:;tvqU,Ckne,S- a,ertDe"' EfaC9 iL" eautjr- , Thus runs Mademoiselle Jullewna's very curious and new philosophy, Particularly Is It applicable to people who create sculptors, painters, writ- ers. etc. You see ber posing In the gay abandon of a Satyr or a Faun, and you will understand that when she reproduces those poses in clay she will "feel" the true outlines which Sunday Bee Magazine - :i r t, .- - .... ;:; W a..; rn: v ' her eye might fall to grasp. Then, from Imitation she proceeds to cre atlon by the same method. What ls grief? What Is despairT What Is fear, surprise, happiness T Those emotions are to be expressed phys ically. Well, "Al Efficiency" en ables her to get the right Idea through illustrations with her own body. "For use In my art work," she says. "I try to develop the dance from the conventional forms to a free movement that expresses not merely motion, but harmonious col ors and supreme grace. I And the greatest inspiration In the ancient sculptures after the schools of Phidias and Praxiteles. Of course, as a student I went through tbe usual period of copying with crayon and clay. But there was something lacking. I had no real understanding of the meaning of those expressions of face and of body. My work was purely mechanical, guided only by the eye and accomplished with such technique as I possessed. "At first, almost unconsciously, In seeking for a better understanding " mubJects, I began to give phys- leal Imitations of them. I would try to express with my own countenance and my own body those emotions those stresses of muscles and those free and graceful movements of body uu nmus. mis experience aunnlltv! iuv uecu i omu ieiu uy nana was moved by a truer instinct, my work improved rapidly. "Quite naturally I passed on to pantomime and dancing to physical Copyright. 115, t T 1: Ymelda Juliewna Impersonating the Emotion of "Pleasurable Surprise," Which Develops Magnetism. depletions of all sorts or emotions. These effort proved fascinating, much more so. 1 am convinced, than If I bad been practising those arts for their own sake alone For. when I felt that my own physical demon stration of a certain emotion was true to life, 1 could set to work with confidence on a permanent record of it by ths Star Cou.piiy. f ' "What eventually happened was as astonishing as It was unexpected My fame as an artist was fctill to be won, but as an exponent of classic dancing I found myself on the top wave of success. But that is doing me no harm. It is only another proof that my real work is the real gainer by the experience. Uy and by, 1 hope, my art works will en Urtat liritaia T.irMa n...rv. A Startling Manifestation of Mile. Juliewna' Ability to Convey a Sense of Ease and Perfect Poise of the Body Practise in Which, She Claims, Enables One to Withstand Emotional Shocks. tirely outclass in public and critical estimation my posing and dancing ability." At the present time Mile. Juliewna finds her Incidental gifts as a dancer especially useful. She is in great demand at society entertainments for the benefit of the various classes of sufferers by the European war. A year ago at the outbreak of the war she was Summering In the Bavarian Highlands, and was unable to leave Germany, either for her home in Russia or to visit relatives in this country. So she returned to Munich and proceeded to make herself use ful in charitable ways. She made her bow as a public dancer for charity at an entertain ment arranged by Munich artists. Her success was Instantaneous. So ciety welcomed her eagerly. The general public applauded her spirited and graceful dancing to the echo, and connoisseurs of that art praised her work in the highest terms. Tbe Munich masters of dancing and of music marvelled at her ac complishments, knowing that her vo cation was sculpture, and that she spent her days In tbe exacting stud ios and practise exacted by the fa mous master whose atller she fre quented as a student. She had kept to herself her practise of posing and classic dancing, and had not ven tured to mention her theories as abova set forth. When her secret leaked out, and her first publlo appearance as a dancer bad brought her so much en viable celebrity, every great master of music and dancing in the Bavar ian capital placed his abilities at her service. That she bad no idea of becoming a professional dancer made no difference tu them: her theories about "Al Efficiency" in her chosen art interested them all the more. Page Here was a new alliance of h"i muses, entirely In line with the cher Ished aim of Richard Wagner, who had achieved his first great successes under the patronage of a Bavarian Kjng, anil whose name every resi dent of Munich Is proud to honor. .Mile. Juliewna found herself, quite unexpectedly, supplied with the ablest and kindliest masters and critics. No longer compelled to teach and criticise herself in her efforts to give physical expression to fundamental emotions, she made rapid strides In the art which she still hold merely supplementary to her vocation of sculptor. The quite remarkable photographs reproduced on this page furtuer demonstrate Mile. Julie wna's ability to win the attention of masters In their different fields. They were taken by Klchard Worschlng, of Sternberg, whose camera Is famous In Europe for producing genuine art effects. ...... These reproductions show how faithful Mile. Juliewna Is to her sculptor's ideal of perfect poise. With ber own body she display re markable control of it gravity in every instance there is conveyed the sense of equilibrium, without which the art of the sculptor is as futile as that of the dancer. ' Classic dancing for the sake7 of classic dancing has some distin guished modern exponents, among whom Isadora Duncan probably is most widely recognized. All these teachers and apostles of the art of dancing are pains taking students of classic sculptures, for these are the source of their dancing ideas the foundation of the art which they are reviving. But it seems to bave re mained for this Russian girl to re verse the process, to make the art of dancing serve the nobler art of sculpture.