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Dance theories of Isadora Duncan were taught in Berkeley for years
High on a Berkeley hillside stands an unusual structure. Called Temple of Wings it served as the home and dance studio for Florence Treadwell Boynton and later for her daughter and son-in-law Sulgwynn and Charles Quitzow until the mid-1980s.
Florence Treadwell Boynton grew up in Oakland and was a childhood friend and admirer of Isadora Duncan. Isadora (1878-1927) was born in San Francisco, but grew up in Oakland where she began giving dance classes as early as the age of 10. Initially inspired by the movement of the ocean, Isadora developed a theory of expressive dance which broke from the restrictive movements of classical ballet.
Inspired also by ancient Greek sculpture and painting, Isadora found images that were the models for her flowing costumes. Isadora told her pupils in her 1927 autobiography, My Life, to “...listen to the music with your soul ... feel an inner self awakening deep within you...”
And she described herself: “... My art is an effort to express truth in gesture and movement ...”
According to some sources, Isadora was the main force in bringing interpretive dance to the mainstream of the creative arts and was one of the most innovative, and internationally famous, turn-of-the 20th-century modern dancers.
Although Isadora lived her adult life in Europe, Florence Treadwell Boynton created a home and dance school that reflected Isadora’s theories and inspirations. Temple of Wings was originally designed and constructed as a Greco-Roman colonnaded open-air residence. The first drawings for the temple were done by Bernard Maybeck in 1911 and the project was completed in 1914.
After the 1923 fire destroyed all but the reinforced concrete Corinthian-style columns, Mrs. Boynton built the present two-story house constructed within the framework of the original columns. It contains two living units on either side of an open U-shaped courtyard. On the ground floor of each unit there is a single large room designed as a dance studio. As a building, the Temple of Wings enhanced the interrelationship of art and daily life symbolizing Berkeley’s reputation at the turn-of-the-twentieth century as the “Athens of the West.”
At the Temple of Wings generations of Berkeley children learned the theories of expressive, interpretive dance under the guidance of Mrs. Boynton or her daughter or son-in-law. Berkeley photographer, Margaretta K. Mitchell captured the dance recitals performed at Temple of Wings during the 1970s in a portfolio entitled “Dance for Life.”
Margaret Norton of the San Francisco Performing Arts Library and Museum referred to Temple of Wings as “one of the crucibles in which modern dance ... was forged.”
Susan Cerny is author of “Berkeley Landmarks” and writes this in conjunction with the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association.
