Laban’s initial work focused on creating a way to record dances in symbols – Labanotation/Kinetography was the result. Analogous to musical notation, this way of looking at movement serves to make a record of the visible structure of movement that can be read and reproduced.
To do so, the notation indicates the parts of the body that are used, the directions and spatial paths they follow, and the duration of these actions. It differentiates among weight-bearing and non-weight bearing actions, with close attention to where a movement is initiated.
As Bartenieff notes, the notations of Laban “can train the eye to observe with accuracy and skill.” Because notation captures the spatial path of bodily actions, it is closely related to another aspect of Laban’s work — space harmony, also known as Choreutics.