Columbia Center for Oral History Portal > Oral history interview with Yvonne Rainer, 2015Biographical NoteYvonne Rainer was born in San Francisco, CA and is a choreographer, dancer, and filmmaker. In 1962 she co-founded the Judson Dance Theater that included Trisha Brown, Simone Forti, Alex Hay, Deborah Hay, and Rauschenberg, among others. During the 1960s, Rainer and Rauschenberg worked together several times on various projects. Beginning in 1972 Rainer shifted her focus to filmmaking and produced seven experimental feature-length films. Rainer's pieces have been performed worldwide, and retrospectives of her work have been shown internationally. Her memoir, Feelings Are Facts: A Life, was published in 2006 and a selection of her poetry was published in 2011
Scope and ContentsYvonne Rainer describes moving to New York in 1956 and committing to study dance and choreography. She talks about when she first became aware of Rauschenberg and how she was eventually welcomed into his entourage or creatives. She discusses the first time they worked together: in 1963 he worked as a light designer for one of her performances at Judson Memorial Church. She reflects on other projects, such as traveling with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, as well as 9 Evenings: Theater and Engineering, which she describes as a technical and personal fiasco due to multiple illnesses and a brief hospitalization. She also discusses Rauschenberg as a very generous and caring individual. She reflects on her relationship with Rauschenberg towards the end of the 1960s; she describes it as blurry, and that her professional distancing after Rauschenberg's collaboration with Trisha Brown was compounded by her disapproval of his alcohol abuse
SubjectsAccess ConditionsCopyright by the Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York and Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, 2014
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