The Origin and Development of Eurythmy 1920–1922

GA 277c — 31 December 1922, Dornach

Address on Eurythmy

This performance, which took place at 5 p.m. in the dome room of the Goetheanum, was to be the last performance there, because on New Year's Eve the First Goetheanum burned down completely.

Draft announcement and newspaper advertisement for the performances, December 30, 1922, to January 1, 1923

Poster for the performance

“Prologue in Heaven” from “Faust I” by J. W. v. Goethe
“Funeral March” by F. Mendelssohn Bartholdy
“To the New Year” by Vladimir Solovyov
“Träumerei” by Max Reger
“Epiphany” by Jose-Maria de Heredia
“Repos en Egypte” by Albert Samain
‘Allegro’ by L. v. Beethoven
“Amien's Song: It was a lover” from “As You Like It” by William Shakespeare
Cheerful overture with music by Leopold van der Pals
“Winter: When icicles hang” from “Love's Labour's Lost” by William Shakespeare
Czech folk song
“Chorus of Insects” from “Faust II,” Act 2 (Study) by J. W. v. Goethe
“Caprice” by Max Reger

Ladies and gentlemen!

Today, in the first part before the intermission, we will present the “Prologue in Heaven” and in the second part, poetic-musical works, poems, and musical pieces performed as eurythmy. I would like to take this opportunity, as usual, to say a few words about the nature of eurythmy. Eurythmy is derived from artistic sources that are still more or less unfamiliar today, and it also works in an artistic formal language that is equally unfamiliar. Eurythmy is a truly visible language.

Just as the human organism unconsciously develops the ability in early childhood to reveal itself spiritually through sound in song—which can then be trained—or through speech, so that the revelation is received by the sense of hearing, so too can that which is experienced spiritually reveal itself externally, not only in audible song or audible speech, but in visible song or visible speech, which lies in the movements [of the limbs] of the individual human being or in the movements or positions of groups of people. This has nothing to do with gestures that are merely mimetic, nor does it have anything to do with dance, but rather with the fact that, just as those movements of the human being that originate unconsciously or semi-consciously from the larynx and the other speech and vocal organs, unconsciously or semi-consciously want to come out of the human being in order to be transmitted through the air and thus be heard audibly, that in the same way, what underlies human soul life as emotional content can be expressed through the movement of human limbs, especially through the movement of the most expressive human limbs, the arms and hands.

If one studies correctly, through sensual-supersensual observation—to use Goethe's expression—how the whole system of the larynx and other internal movements is connected with the movements of the air, and if one then transfers this with the appropriate metamorphosis to the human arms and hands in particular, then one obtains a range of gestures to which the ordinary gestures – with which we accompany our speech in order to aid understanding – to which these simpler gestures, indeed the simpler facial expressions used by actors, relate like the babbling of a child to truly articulated, trained speech or to trained singing.

So the ordinary facial expressions, the ordinary gestures, would actually be the babbling, and what one discovers through a precise study, a sensual-supersensual study of the movement possibilities of the human organism, is then the visible, trained singing or the visible, trained speech. And everything that the soul can otherwise express through singing or speech can also be expressed through this visible language, through this visible singing.

However, it must be taken into account that, on the one hand, what eurythmy is — although this transition should not be too pronounced — merges into ordinary gestures; ordinary facial expressions must not be confused with eurythmy gestures. On the other hand, what eurythmy is – this becomes apparent the more a person performs dance-like movements, the more what they express in form, in rhythm, in the rhythm of the movements, corresponds to music. But the more a person sets their organism in motion with their soul, which flows into the articulation of the hands, into the articulation of the arms, the more they perform movements in this way, the more these movements become a visible linguistic expression. So that on the one hand, you will see in our presentation how music is accompanied by such movements. People sing visibly, whereas otherwise they sing audibly. Likewise, you will hear poetry recited and declaimed, accompanied by eurythmic movements of the whole person, of groups of people, and accompanied in particular by the movement of the arms and hands.

This movement of the arms and hands is now a perfect expression of what poetry is – just like spoken language itself. However, while the movements of the arms and hands, in the movements of the whole person during visible singing, actually express more of what accompanies the music as feelings from the soul, eurythmic speech, when used correctly, actually brings everything pictorial, melodious, rhythmic, and also the content of the language to a real revelation. This enables us to bring to visible expression what the poet puts into his work of art as, I might say, an inner eurythmy, as an expression of the whole human being. And this gives us the opportunity to express the dramatic and poetic in a higher style than through ordinary facial expressions.

This can be seen particularly clearly in a poem such as the one that was just performed eurythmically before the break, Goethe's “Prologue in Heaven.” A powerful, grandiose image of angelic figures appears before us, speaking to reveal the intentions of the worlds. It is accompanied by what Mephisto has to say. But everything that relates to the supersensible as experiences of the human soul can be expressed particularly well through this higher stylization of eurythmy. And once you are familiar with eurythmy, you immediately feel the need to move away from the usual naturalistic mimicry for those scenes that relate to the supersensible, and in this way also to achieve a more perfect stage representation of such scenes, as Goethe's “Prologue in Heaven” represents.

Of course, one could also express what Mephisto has to say in eurythmic form. However, insofar as human beings also live as soul-spiritual-supernatural beings, it is precisely this inner being that is expressed and revealed through eurythmic speech movements. And we can also apply this when we want to express angelic beings. However, we have not yet invented devil eurythmy, and so Mephisto still has to be portrayed today using entirely naturalistic facial expressions. Perhaps one day we will succeed in discovering the corresponding “devil language” – I mean in eurythmic form – and then this too can be portrayed eurythmically.

But we are really striving to shape the whole stage setting more and more according to eurythmy. And this reveals something that is particularly interesting. For some time now, we have been striving to support what is to be portrayed poetically or musically, and also eurythmically, with appropriate lighting on the stage, which must harmonize with the costumes of the individual characters performing eurythmically. And here something peculiar becomes apparent.

For example, when performing something purely musical – instrumental music, I mean – it is possible, under certain circumstances, to use lighting effects to create parallel phenomena, parallel light phenomena, which in their sequence produce an impression similar to that of the musical form or musical content. But it is quite different to do something like this in an opera performance, for example, than to do it in our eurythmic performance. In opera, one always has the feeling that the lighting effects are really just something like an accompaniment to the work of art, something that is added to the work of art from outside, whereas here the lighting effects are strictly internal, connected with the work of art, namely with the eurythmic work of art. So that one also gets the feeling: just as the mood when singing emanates from the human being, so to speak, emanates to all sides of the room, and just as one could represent this emanating mood as light effects, so the whole mood that the stage design must bring about through lighting effects in a eurythmic performance this mood is like something that does not radiate from the eurythmic figures, but rather has the effect of the eurythmic figures absorbing these bodies of light, these masses of light, as if they were moving toward them, as if they needed them.

In short, all kinds of peculiarities of this visible language, this eurythmy, will be discovered over time. Today, it is really only in its infancy. On the one hand, you will find that eurythmy is accompanied by music. There is singing, visible singing. You will find it accompanied by recitation and declamation. There is speech.

Now it has become increasingly apparent that it is actually something quite inorganic and inartistic when the person performing the eurythmic movements wants to speak the words at the same time. It has become apparent that the artistic aspect actually consists in the fact that the person who expresses their soul in movement becomes completely silent to the ear, and that what is presented to the ear is presented separately in recitation and declamation or in instrumental music. Even the singer, if they were to accompany something eurythmic, would have to sing separately, not sing eurythmically themselves. But in this way, one actually obtains within the art of eurythmy, I would say, an expanded orchestra, an orchestra composed of what goes on in the mere visible movement and what is presented musically or declamatorily or recitatively. And this whole interaction is subject to the same orchestral laws as a musical one. One could therefore quite rightly speak of instrumentation in this context.

These things will gradually be discovered from the essence of eurythmy. They have been inherent for a long time. We must bear in mind that eurythmy is still in its infancy and that it will continue to develop further and further. However, it is already apparent that the secrets of language only really reveal themselves when one begins to understand the essence of eurythmy. It is therefore also apparent that recitation and declamation themselves must be transferred from what they are today in a somewhat inartistic age—where the prosaic is actually emphasized or highlighted in poetry, and the essential is sought in the prosaic highlighting of the poetic— that this declamatory and recitative style must in turn be carried over to where Goethe had it, who rehearsed his iambic dramas with his actors according to rhythm and beat — which was much more important to him — as [he] rehearsed his iambs with a baton like a conductor; in other words, less the prosaic content and more the musical and imaginative aspects of speech formation.

In the pictorial shaping of the sound, recitation and declamation actually give rise to something imaginative. By taking into account the melodious, the rhythmic, the metrical, one obtains something musical in language. Simply by introducing these things into recitation and declamation, one can accompany what is offered eurythmically in the right way.

Taking all this into account, I would like to ask my esteemed audience for their indulgence, as always, for the presentation, since it must be emphasized that we are only at the beginning of the development of the art of eurythmy. However, it will certainly be perfected more and more by us or others. Today, however, it can already be said that it will be able to undergo this perfection in an immeasurable way, because it makes use of the most perfect instrument: the human being himself.

And the human being is a microcosm, containing all the secrets of the world, all the laws of the world, animation, spiritualization. If one brings out of him that which can truly be brought out in such an intimate way, by setting the whole human being in motion, then at the same time the secrets of the world express themselves through the human being. And it is indeed true that when Goethe says: When human beings are placed at the summit of nature, they bring together order, measure, harmony, and meaning and reveal these by elevating themselves to works of art — then one can say: Human beings will be able to elevate what lies in the world to a work of art in the most perfect way when they seek order and measure, harmony and meaning in their own organic movement and expression, thereby revealing precisely what lives in their soul and spirit.

Taking this into account, one can truly say that it is already possible today to sense how this eurythmic art, despite being only in the early stages of development, will one day be able to stand alongside the established older arts as a fully-fledged younger art form.