In Celebration of Jack Mitchell

March 30, 2014

Capturing dance’s—and
Dance Magazine’s—greatest moments for over four decades. All photos © Jack Mitchell, used with permission of the estate.

 

 

Clockwise from top left: Merce Cunningham, 1962; Agnes de Mille, 1980; Ruth St. Denis in
White Jade, 1950.

 

 

In November, the dance world lost one of its most prolific photographers, Jack Mitchell (1925–2013), whose work helped chronicle an epoch in dance history. In a career spanning more than 40 years, Mitchell captured almost every major figure in the field, from ballet legends to downtown dancemakers, as well as tap dancers, b-boys and composers.

A longtime contributor to Dance Magazine, Mitchell’s work has filled our pages since the early 1950s. He photographed more than 160 covers; subjects included José Limón, George Balanchine, Merce Cunningham and Bob Fosse. And though he announced his retirement in 1996, he received a Dance Magazine Award in 2002 and remained on the magazine’s masthead until his death.

Mitchell also found great success outside of dance: His portraits for publications like The New York Times, Rolling Stone and Vanity Fair included John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Alfred Hitchcock and Meryl Streep. Today, the Thrasher-Horne Center for the Arts in Florida is home to some of Mitchell’s most iconic work, including the images on these pages.

 

 

 

Clockwise from top left: Martha Graham in
Alcestis, 1962; Paul Taylor in Aureole, 1979; Mikhail Baryshnikov rehearsing Taylor’s Aureole, 1993.