Eve Gentry’s Art of Teaching

By Kathy Corey

“Seeing is to movement what listening is to music. It is not enough to hear, you must listen. It is not enough to look, you must see.”

Eve Gentry had a special gift for teaching. She felt you must develop an “eye” and to be able to see with sensitivity. And, that this deep level of sensitivity could enable you to know something about a person that they might not even know about themselves, and therefore, they can not even tell you. “That’s part of teaching. Teaching anything. If one approaches teaching in this way, it’s always renewing, it’s always challenging”.

Eve Gentry was revered among the Pilates Master Teachers. She arrived in New York in 1936. Her teaching developed from her training with Laban, Hanya Holm and Pilates.
“Pilates, Laban and Feldenkrais all knew each other. Their works synchronized. They educated me.”

Eve started with Joe Pilates in 1942 and continued to work with him until 1968. In the 1960’s Eve was invited to teach at NYU School of the Arts. With Joe’s permission, she set up a program for dancers, singers and actors that used springs attached to the walls with the Mat.

In 1968, she moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico. “Coming to Santa Fe and being left on my own, where I had no stimulus and where there was no dancing, was the most wonderful thing to have happened to me. That’s when I rediscovered myself. That’s when I began to work creatively. I developed all kinds of ideas I never would have developed in New York.”

“I learned to teach concepts and not things.” Eve felt that what was hardest about teaching is the individual – the individual who is negative, the individual who is not honest about their own needs, the individual who is afraid, the individual who does not want you to get them. But to be a good teacher, you have to be interested in people and ready to accept them. You must be open and find out what they need. “And so, it’s always an excursion, it’s always interesting.”

Eve taught with an open hand and an open heart. She touched you in many ways and because of the way she saw and moved and touched you, you could feel her and hear her and receive the information from her in an open way. She taught to approach people with openness. “One learns a lot by just opening doors. You can’t open doors for your students unless you open your own doors. Things that you work at all your life are opening doors.”

Being in Eve’s presence was a special gift of its own. She was gracious and eloquent. The quotes and information in this article are from a conversation I had with Eve at her studio in 1993, a year before she died at 84 years old. The time I spent working with Eve has greatly influenced my approach to teaching.

Michele Larsson carries on Eve’s work with the same gracious spirit. Michele became a student of Eve’s in 1970 and began teaching mat in 1979. Her formal training with Eve started in 1982 and for four months she trained from nine to five every day. This direct lineage is so important to the future of the Pilates work. To honor the link Michele provides to Eve’s work, honors our link to Joe and Clara Pilates.

For more information about Eve Gentry or to purchase the documentary of Eve Gentry: The Power of Pilates, visit Michele’s website at www.coredynamicspilates.com.  The documentary is about her life as she evolved from a dancer into a teacher into a Pilates teacher , into a healer. It is an evolution that few people make.

About the Author: Master Teacher Kathy Corey began her career with the Pilates Technique in 1979. She has been the leading expert in the Pilates community for 30 years. She is the Director of Kathy Corey Pilates, an Advisory Board Member for Inner IDEA and an Advisory Board Member for Pilates Style Magazine. The Kathy Corey Pilates Certification Program is taught at locations across the United States and her continuing education programs are taught in twelve countries. In 2004, she designed the innovative CORE Band™ which is also used in studios around the world.
Corey is PMA Pilates Gold Certified and she has been selected by IDEA as one of ten people in the world “Who Inspire the World to Fitness,” the fitness industry’s highest form of recognition.

Tags: Eve Gentry, Kathy Corey, Michele Larsson