In Praise of Kathy Grant
Photo of Kathy Grant by Blossom Leilani Crawford
This Black History Month, we have been celebrating the remarkable life of Pilates pioneer, dancer, and activist Kathy Grant. We are very proud to be part of Kathy’s teaching lineage.
Born in Boston in 1921, Kathy was the first Black student enrolled in the dance program at Boston Conservatory. She dreamed of a career as a ballerina, but rampant racism in classical dance left her with limited options. She took work in the chorus at the Zanzibar Night Club, toured Europe and the Middle East, and appeared in Broadway’s first integrated production, Finnigan’s Rainbow.
After Kathy injured her knee, Martha Graham dancer Pearl Lang told her to go study with a man named Joseph Pilates, who would make her dance again. Kathy became one of Joe’s closest disciples. In 1972, she took over his studio inside the legendary Bendel’s Department Store, which is where our teacher Clarice Marshall (also on the mend from a knee injury) first discovered this work.
Kathy’s influence was sweeping; she helped found Dance Theatre of Harlem, became the first African American panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts, and taught a whole generation of dancers at NYU. She died in 2010 at 88, and our friend Blossom Crawford of Bridge Pilates has a beautiful tribute website filled with reminiscences, exercises, and fascinating “artifacts.”
If you subscribe to Pilates Anytime (first month free trial!) you can sweat along to this classic video of Kathy teaching mat Pilates at Tisch. She was a complex personality – playful, disciplined, sometimes harsh – whose masterful teaching combined a poet’s language, dancer’s rhythm, and healer’s touch. We’ve been incorporating Kathy's creative exercises like the fan kick and the bicycle sit ups into our sessions this month at Knockout Pilates. Although we never knew her, we are grateful to claim her as a Pilates ancestor and remain inspired by her excellence.