Sybil Shearer was hailed as a "maverick" or "mystic" of modern dance. She studied at Skidmore College

Skidmore College

Skidmore College is a private, independent, liberal arts college with an enrollment of approximately 2,500 students. The college is located in the town of Saratoga Springs, New York State....

, graduating in 1934, and then pursued modern dance at Bennington College

Bennington College

Bennington College is a liberal arts college located in Bennington, Vermont, USA. The college was founded in 1932 as a women's college and became co-educational in 1969.-History:-Early years:...

's summer workshops in Vermont

Vermont

Vermont is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state ranks 43rd in land area, , and 45th in total area. Its population according to the 2010 census, 630,337, is the second smallest in the country, larger only than Wyoming. It is the only New England...

, with Doris Humphrey

Doris Humphrey

Doris Batcheller Humphrey was a dancer and choreographer of the early twentieth century. Humphrey was born in Oak Park, Illinois but grew up in Chicago, Illinois. She was the daughter of Horace Buckingham Humphrey and Julia Ellen Wells and was a descendant of pilgrim William Brewster...

, Martha Graham

Martha Graham

Martha Graham was an American modern dancer and choreographer whose influence on dance has been compared with the influence Picasso had on modern visual arts, Stravinsky had on music, or Frank Lloyd Wright had on architecture.She danced and choreographed for over seventy years...

 and Hanya Holm

Hanya Holm

Hanya Holm is known as one of the “Big Four” founders of American modern dance...

.

Career

Shearer's first solo concert in New York

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, in 1941, at Carnegie Hall

Carnegie Hall

Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....

, caused a sensation. Shortly after her New York triumph, she walked away from the fame that was opening for her, settling instead in the American Midwest in the mid-1940s, where she continued to perform in the Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

 area, and inspired numerous students of dance including John Neumeier who is now director of the Hamburg Ballet.

Dance historian Margaret Lloyd, in The Borzoi Book of Modern Dance, described Shearer as "a perfectionist who likes to believe that perfection is humanly attainable". Shearer was among the first performers to tackle spiritual and social justice issues, such as the plight of factory workers, a theme of one of her pieces. She drew ideas and inspiration from a variety of artistic influences, including lengthy correspondence with Agnes de Mille

Agnes de Mille

Agnes George de Mille was an American dancer and choreographer.-Early years:Agnes de Mille was born in New York City into a well-connected family of theater professionals. Her father William C. deMille and her uncle Cecil B. DeMille were both Hollywood directors...

 and Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf

Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....

.

Works

Shearer depicted both spiritual visions and human foible in her works which were mostly solo pieces. She created "Let the Heavens Open That the Earth May Shine" in 1947 which celebrated spiritual ideals. "In a Vacuum" (1941) explored earthly problems and portrayed an assembly-line worker with physically demanding but unrelated movements that suggested dehumanization. Shearer created "Once Upon a Time" in 1951 which was a suite of solos for fantastically named characters. Thus Medmiga was an ominous witch, Yanchi was fey, Relluckus was woebegone and Ziff fluttered aimlessly. Shearer also choreographed group works, among them "Fables and Proverbs" (1961) and "The Reflection in the Puddle Is Mine" (1963).

Style

In a photo book by John Martin, Shearer is often seen wearing loose fitting garments are highly theatrical costumes. Combining the technique of ballet and the freedom of modern dance, Shearer utilized a pointed or flexed foot, long extended limbs, and contorted shapes or straight lines of the body.

Collaboration

Many of Sybil Shearer's productions were in collaboration with Helen Balfour Morrison, a photographer and filmmaker who documented Shearer's career.

Accomplishments

Shearer was appointed artist-in-residence at the Arnold Theatre of the National College of Education located in Evanston, Illinois in 1962. The school was looking to have an artist of great caliber working close by. As artist-in-residence Shearer was given the freedom to create works with her company, derived from her repertory, whenever and however she pleased. Her only obligation was to produce one piece that would be performed at the institute's annual assembly. John Martin of New York Times wrote that Shearer's appointment was the start of alliances formed between established artists and educational institutions.

The Morrison-Shearer Foundation

The Morrison-Shearer Foundation, established in 1991,preserves the works related to the careers of photographer Helen Balfour Morrison and dancer-choreographer Sybil Shearer. The foundation also maintains the home and studio where the pair lived and worked and it sponsors new creativity. It is supported entirely by income from the Foundation's investments.

The Foundation’s current projects are to complete the publication of Sybil Shearer’s three-volume autobiography Without Wings the Way is Steep; to preserve and archive all photographs, films, letters, manuscripts, reviews and other memorabilia; to provide modest annual Board-initiated grants in support of current work in the arts, especially dance; to explore the possibilities of creating an artists’ retreat at the home and studio in Northbrook, Illinois

Northbrook, Illinois

Northbrook is a village located at the northern edge of Cook County, Illinois, which is also a North Shore suburb of Chicago. The population was 33,170 at the 2010 census....

; and to share the Morrison-Shearer legacy through a website and other means. The first volume of Sybil Shearer's three-part autobiography, Without Wings the Way Is Steep (a title taken from one of her dances), was released in 2008.

Death

Shearer made her last appearance, at age 93, at the Art Institute of Chicago

Art Institute of Chicago

The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...

, in one of her solos called Flame. She died in Evanston, Illinois

Evanston, Illinois

Evanston is a suburban municipality in Cook County, Illinois 12 miles north of downtown Chicago, bordering Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, and Wilmette to the north, with an estimated population of 74,360 as of 2003. It is one of the North Shore communities that adjoin Lake Michigan...

in 2005.