National Dance Prize 2021 awarded to Laura Alonso

HAVANA, Cuba, Apr 29 (ACN) After meeting on Wednesday at the National Council of Performing Arts (CNAE), the jury in charge of granting the National Dance Award 2021 decided to name Grand Maître Laura Alonso as the winner of the award.

According to information shared by the CNAE on its Twitter profile, the jury headed by maestro Johannes García, National Dance Award 2020, made the decision after their meeting at the institution.

Teacher of several generations of Cuban dancers, Laura Alonso began her studies at the Ballet School of the Pro-Arte Musical Society of Havana, with Alberto Alonso, Leon Fokine and other teachers.

She was a soloist with the National Ballet of Cuba for more than two decades. Later, in the 80's of the last century, she created the Department of Specialized Teaching, within the first Cuban company, to promote the methodology of the Cuban ballet school through the CUBALLET courses.

Daughter of Alicia and Fernando Alonso, who, together with Alberto Alonso, were the promoters of a Cuban style of academic dance, Laura inherited the passion for the art of pointe and lived from a very young age between rehearsal rooms and staging.

According to the CNAE, Laura, as a dancer, has to her credit an important number of pieces within the repertoire of the National Ballet of Cuba, standing out in classical, romantic roles and other choreographies where she displayed her technical virtuosity and character when interpreting.
The creation of the ProDanza Center was perhaps the most important consolidation of her artistic career.

This institution, since its inception, brought together groups of various genres of dance, and hosted La Joven Guardia, a space for the professional development of young dancers, who later became leading figures of the National Ballet of Cuba.

Since the founding of the National School of Art, her work as a teacher in the men's class, a task she maintained for several years, is noteworthy.

She even taught in other national artistic groups such as the Ballet of the Cuban Institute of Radio Broadcasting (ICR) and the Musical Theater of Havana, she was also a teacher at the University of the Arts (ISA) and promoter of the Psicoballet movement, she has been the director of this plan since its inception in 1973, and has deployed in it her ability and enthusiasm.

For this incessant pedagogical work that she has deployed inside and outside Cuba, she has obtained many recognitions, consecrating Laura Alonso as the Grand Maître of Cuba.