November 8th to 11th, 2004

Rosana van Langendonck
rolang@terra.com.br
PUC-SP - Brazil

CHARLES SANDERS PEIRCE'S COSMOLOGIC PROPOSAL APPLIED TO THE CHOREOGRAPHIC PROCESS OF MERCE CUNNINGHAM

ABSTRACT
The observation of the process by which the American choreographer Merce Cunningham, one of the precursors of post-modern dance in the west, constructs his dance leads to the proposal of reading his work in the light of the scientific philosophy of Charles Sanders Peirce (1837-1914), particularly his Cosmology.
Throughout this work, we will try to demonstrate: that Cunningham constructs ,in his creative process, a Cosmology; that his creation develops in consonance with the creative movements of the Universe , and that the choreographer brings into dance the working methods of Nature and the Cosmos.
Cunningham champions the independence between the arts which compose a dance performance; music, dance and scenery are constructed separately, only occurring in the same time/ space. We intend to show the existence of a thought structure that moulds dance and the correlated arts in his performance, for it is within this structure that, through agreements, the different art forms act out independently and appear harmonised on stage.
The operations of chance that Cunningham introduces in his choreographic work bring the ludic aspects of the process to the scene. In this work the aspects of temporariness, generality, and randomness will be analysed based on Peirce´s metaphysic concepts of time, law and chance.

KEYWORDS: Cosmology, Semiotics, Dance.

Center for Pragmatism Studies
Philosophy Graduate Program
Departament of Philosophy
Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo - Brazil