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RARE AND IMPORTANT EARLY MODERN DANCE
417
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(MUSIC—DANCE.) WILLIAMS, CHARLES HOLSTON.
Hampton Institute
Creative Dance Group. Souvenir Program * [together with] a small printed pro-
gram for the group’s appearance at Montclair High School in New Jersey.
Illustrated from photographs. 8 pages, large 4to, original decorative wrappers; the second
piece, four pages, slightly smudged.
Hampton, VA and Newark, NJ, 1937
[500/750]
A RARE PICTORIAL SOUVENIR OF THE FIRST MODERN AFRICAN
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AMERICAN DANCE COM
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PANY
.
Charles Holston Williams (1886-1978), served as Departmental Chair of Physical
Education at Hampton Institute and as part of that program co-founded the Hampton Institute
Creative Dance Group together with Charlotte Moton Kennedy. This extraordinary troupe antici-
pated the modern dance model of Alvin Ailey by mixing old Negro spirituals and field/work songs
with traditional dance and music. The noted choreographer Ted Shawn (1891-1972) created a num-
ber for the group titled “Cutting the Sugar Cane,” which was set on a Cuban plantation, and
utilized Cuban motifs. Other numbers were based on traditional African themes (Mamah Parah,
Ogugo and the Fangai Man, etc). There was even a number descriptive of the feast of Ramadan.
Unfortunately little was ever recorded of the group and the only visual record of the actual dances sur-
vives in the twenty-one photographs seen in this program; and possibly some originals remaining at
Hampton (?). This souvenir program was part of the group’s 1937 tour, their first.
418
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(MUSIC.) BAKER, JOSEPHINE.
Photograph Signed.
9 x 7 inch silver print
photograph.
INSCRIBED AND SIGNED
.
Np (France), 1938
[400/600]
Inscribed by Josephine: “A Madamoiselle Jane de Coty (?), avec toute ma sympathie, Josephine
Baker, 9/1/38.”
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