“Dance Is a Weapon”
The New Dance Group formed in 1932 as part of a workers’ dance movement. Adopting the slogan, “The dance is a weapon in the class struggle,” the founders reacted against modernist attempts “to make the subject matter of the dance abstract.” Their critically acclaimed “Van der Lubbe’s Head,” performed to the satiric poem by Alfred Hayes (1911–1985), memorialized a communist martyr guillotined by the Nazis for setting the Reichstag fire. The group continued to be influential into the 1960s.
The New Dance Group formed in 1932 as part of a workers’ dance movement. Adopting the slogan, “The dance is a weapon in the class struggle,” the founders reacted against modernist attempts “to make the subject matter of the dance abstract.” Their critically acclaimed “Van der Lubbe’s Head,” performed to the satiric poem by Alfred Hayes (1911–1985), memorialized a communist martyr guillotined by the Nazis for setting the Reichstag fire. The group continued to be influential into the 1960s.