Book Launch: Noa Eshkol – Movement Notation

Movement Notation is considered to be the first publication of the “Eshkol-Wachman Movement Notation” (EWMN), developed by artist, choreographer, and dance theorist Noa Eshkol and architect Avraham Wachmann. With this polyphonic notation system, Eshkol and Wachmann focused dance on its basic element: the movement of the human body. They treated the different parts of the body as separate instruments, similar to the musical instruments of an orchestra–each with its own rules for the movements to be performed. This new edition of the 1958 publication is supplemented by contributions from Eshkol’s companions and further archive material, which contextualizes and supplements the history of the EWMN’s origins and embeds it in contemporary discourses on dance and movement.

The publication of a second print edition was published in the context of the performance Pause: The Noa Eshkol Chamber Dance Group at KW Institute for Contemporary Art (August 2023), as well as the exhibition Noa Eshkol: No Time to Dance at the Georg Kolbe Museum (March–August 2024). The new edition was initiated by curator Krist Gruijthuijsen, Director of the KW Institute for Contemporary Art. It was developed in collaboration with the Noa Eshkol Archive for Movement Notation, edited by Krist Gruijthuijsen and Mor Bashan, and supported by an Artis Research Grant. Additional support was provided by neugerriemschneider, the German Federal Cultural Foundation, and Freundeskreis Georg Kolbe Museum.

The Tel Aviv Dance Festival of the Suzanne Dellal Centre will present the new print edition on the occasion of this year’s 100th birthday of Noa Eshkol (1924–2007).