JOSEPH PILATES, THE MAN BEHIND THE METHOD

1927 a German called Josep Pilates opened his studio in Manhattan. He called his method Contrology, but everybody started to say "I am going to Pilates". Joseph Hubertus Pilates was born on December 9, 1883 in Mönchengladbach (near Düsseldorf), Germany. His father, a native of Greece, had been a prize-winning gymnast, while his German-born mother was a naturopath who believed in the principle of stimulating the body to heal itself without artificial drugs. No doubt his mother's healing philosophy and father's physical achievements greatly influenced Pilates' later ideas on therapeutic exercise. Small and sickly as a child, he was afflicted with asthma, rickets, and rheumatic fever, and was continually taunted by the bigger children. He quickly became determined to overcome his physical disadvantages. Thereupon young Joseph began to self-educate himself in anatomy, bodybuilding, wrestling, yoga, gymnastics, and martial arts. He soon achieved an almost Adonis-like "anatomical ideal," to the extent that at the age of 14 he was posing as a model for anatomy charts. He was also an accomplished boxer, skier, and diver.His physique was such that, like Eugen Sandow, Pilates in his public career as a circus entertainer used to perform a "living Greek statue" act. He was enamored of the classical Greek ideal of a man who is balanced equally in body, mind, and spirit, and he came to believe that our modern lifestyle, bad posture, and inefficient breathing were the roots of poor health. At Pilates Marbella we are devoted to keeping the true spirit of the authentic method alive, not only because we feel gratitude towards Joseph Pilates but also because we see how the original method provides amazing results.Nowadays you can find pilates studios in every corner but few instructor are trained in the true method that requires years of training and study of the human body. Francisco Benitez is trained in Germany under the strict protocol of Davorka Kulenovic owner of the New York Pilates Studio in Stuttgart. www.pilates-newyork.de