CubaMinrex. Sitio del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Cuba

Alicia Alonso in New York to Receive Tribute from American Ballet Theater

CUBA, May 31, 2010. The founding director of the Cuban National Ballet (BNC), prima ballerina assoluta Alicia Alonso, traveled on Sunday to New York where she will receive a tribute from the American Ballet Theater at New York’s Metropolitan Opera House next Thursday in celebration of her 90th birthday.

Also on Thursday, the exhibition “Alicia Alonso Dances Tonight” will be inaugurated at the Magnam Metz gallery with 30 pieces mainly from the Cuban national museums of Dance and Fine Arts.

The ballerina, who still actively directs the BNC, was born on December 21, 1920, and has already received birthday tributes across the world, including in London and Enghien-les-Bains, France, last April.

In May, she received the “Hispanic Ties” distinction in Spain. The award was bestowed on the Cuban dancer by the Cultura Viva Foundation, which comprises academicians and intellectuals from several Spanish institutions.

Recently, she was nominated to the Prince of Asturias Awards in Arts, one of the most prestigious awards in the Ibero-Americas.

Alonso has received doctorates from the University of Havana, the Cuban Higher Institute of Arts and the Poli-Techical University of Valencia in Spain. She is also a Member of Honor of the Spanish Association of Stage Directors and she has received other awards such as the Royal Order of Isabel the Catholic, awarded by Spanish King Juan Carlos I; the Gold Medal of the Fine Arts Circle of Madrid; the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (Order of Arts and Letters) of France; and UNESCO’s
Pablo Picasso Medal, among others.

The Cuban dancer and choreographer began her professional career with the American Ballet Theater, where she danced the main role in Giselle in a critically-acclaimed performance in 1943. (Cubaminrex- ACN)

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