Cuban Ballerina Alicia Alonso Appointed ‘Star of the Century’

The world’s most renowned Cuban artist will receive the award in February 2019, which was also given to musician Benny More.

Other stars such as Libertad Lamarque, Pedro Infante and Agustin Lara, among others, have also received this award.

Last December 21, Alonso celebrated her 98 birthday while the company she directs rehearses one of her favorite classics, El Lago de los Cisnes (Swam Lake), an unavoidable work in her career.

Together with the Fernando and Alberto Alonso, she founded the first professional ballet company in Cuba, 60 years ago, when this art was scarcely understood in Latin societies.

Alonso supported the social revolution in Cuba that begun in 1959, and stood up on prejudices and bourgeois ideologies to bring her art to the people.

In the world of dance she became famous for her prodigious twists and the particular way in which she appropriated the technique, for which she became the main character of legends.

The artist continues to be active as a teacher, choreographer and director of the Cuban National Ballet and the Havana International Ballet Festival, in which the most renowned dancers of the planet participate.