Aurora de los Ángeles Bosch Fernández

Ballet dancer and ballet instructor. One of the four historic ballet dancers in Cuba, known as "the four jewels."

She was born into a humble home. Her grandmother learned of a call for applications from the Academia de Ballet Alicia Alonso in 1951 to compete for study scholarships and presented the young woman, who after an audition was accepted and began her history in the art of dance with instructor Magda González Mora, continuing with Puerto Rican José Parés and later with instructor Fernando Alonso.

From the beginning she was used as an extra in company performances, which is why her stage debut took place in 1954, as a page of the queen mother in the continental premiere of the complete version of Swan Lake, with Ballet Alicia Alonso (today Ballet Nacional de Cuba).

Her small stature in childhood prevented her from taking on roles of importance; nevertheless, she performed in the Academy's productions. But in 1956, before the company's temporary closure, a prior national tour was organized, and a dancer from the corps de ballet was absent for a performance in Matanzas; then Aurora was called upon to take her place in Les Sylphides, which meant her true professional debut.

In that difficult period for Cuban ballet, she joined the Taller Experimental de Danza and was called by Alicia Alonso to participate in the production of Giselle performed at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles, United States, in 1958, which would be repeated the following year with the ballet Coppélia.

On her first visit she also performed with the Ballet Celeste of San Francisco. Simultaneously, Aurora began her long career as a ballet instructor at the branch of the Academia de Ballet in the Kohly neighborhood in Havana, and also in the cities of Matanzas and Cárdenas.

In 1959 she completed her ballet studies and participated in auditions to join the new Ballet Nacional de Cuba.

That year she performed an extensive tour throughout South America with the company and the following year another to Mexico and the countries of Eastern Europe, which extended until 1961.

Promoted to the rank of soloist in 1962, she progressively assumed roles from the traditional and contemporary repertoire, and others by young Cuban choreographers: Despertar, by Enrique Martínez, and Ensayo renacentista, by Lorenzo Monreal.

In 1963 she performed as one of the "friends" in the film Giselle, made by the Instituto Cubano de Arte e Industria Cinematográficos (ICAIC) and starring Alicia Alonso with Ballet Nacional de Cuba.

In 1967 she was promoted to prima ballerina, the highest rank in Cuban ballet. She assumed, in the company's repertoire, the classics Swan Lake, Coppélia, Giselle (in which her interpretation of Myrtha, the Queen of the Wilis, earned her the Anna Pávlova Award from the University of Dance in Paris during the IV International Dance Festival of the Champs Elysées in 1966), La bayadera, The Sleeping Beauty; as well as twentieth-century creations Apollo and Theme and Variations, by George Balanchine; Lilac Garden, by Anthony Tudor; In the Night, by Jerome Robbins, and works by Cuban choreographers Space and Movement, by Alberto Alonso Rayneri; Rara Avis, by Alberto Méndez González; Hécuba, by Iván Tenorio (composed especially for her) and Dan-Son, by Gustavo Herrera.

As a member of Ballet Nacional de Cuba she toured all continents, but her international activity extended to other companies: Ballet Clásico de México, of which she was director and prima ballerina in 1969; Ballet Independiente and Ballet Clásico 1970, also in Mexico, where she was also an instructor; the opera theaters of Bucharest, Iași and Cluj, in Romania; of Vilnius, Odessa and Tashkent, and the Bolshoi Ballet State Group, in the former Soviet Union; as well as the international galas of the I International Dance Festival of Chicago and the International Gala of Monte Carlo.

Her career as a dancer, professor and ballet instructor also took her to London, Denmark, Mexico, the United States, and of course to Cuba, where she continues her work training new generations of dancers and instructors, and to Spain, specifically to Ballet Nacional de España.

She participated in the II and III Ballet Competitions in Varna, Bulgaria, in 1965 and 1966, where she respectively obtained silver and gold medals, confirming the solidity of what was initially called the "Cuban miracle" and later recognized as the Cuban school of ballet.

In 1967 she received from the hands of Serge Lifar the "Ana Pavlova" Award from the University of Dance in Paris for her extraordinary interpretation of the character of the Queen of the Wilis in the ballet Giselle.

For her selfless devotion to art she has received various awards and honors: the National Dance Award, the award from the Gran Teatro de La Habana, the Félix Varela Order and the Medal of Merit from the Brazilian Dance Council.

Possessor of a technique described by critics as "brilliant and shining, strong as a diamond," Aurora Bosch is one of the most solid pillars of the Cuban school of ballet.

In 2003 she received the National Dance Award granted by UNEAC and the National Council of the Performing Arts.

In the period 2003-2005 she was maître and guest professor at the Conservatorio de Sevilla and member of the Choreographic Jury of that Spanish city, the Central School of Ballet in London and the National Ballet School of Budapest, Hungary.

In 2005 she received the status of Emeritus Member awarded by the Association of Performing Artists of UNEAC.