Loipa Yolanda Araujo Carruana

===BODY===
Cuban dancer; professor and ballet maître. One of the four historic dancers of Cuban ballet known as "the four jewels".

She was born in the municipality of 10 de Octubre; her father was a doctor and her mother a teacher.

The Cuban Loipa Araújo currently constitutes, in her dual capacity as dancer and "ballet mistress", one of the most relevant personalities of the Cuban school of ballet and Cuban culture.

Daughter of professionals, she began her ballet studies at the Sociedad Pro Arte Musical in 1948 and continued them at the Alicia Alonso Ballet Academy, beginning in 1955, the year she made her professional debut with the Ballet de Cuba company (now Ballet Nacional de Cuba).

She had been a student at Pro Arte Musical under Alberto Alonso Rayneri and at the Academy she studied with Fernando Alonso, who taught her, in addition to technique, a taste for perfection, attention to detail, and eternal dissatisfaction. She also received classes from Puerto Rican José Parés and Russian León Fokin.

During the period of closure of the Ballet de Cuba between 1956 and 1959, she was invited by Alicia Alonso to the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles in 1957, where she performed in the ballet Coppélia. The following year she repeated the visit, this time for a performance of Giselle, and she also performed in the Ballet Celeste of San Francisco.

She participated in the reorganization of the Ballet Nacional de Cuba in 1959 and toured Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru, and Ecuador. With this company she traveled to five continents, first as part of the corps de ballet and in 1962 as a soloist. In 1967 she was promoted to the rank of prima ballerina, the highest position within Cuba's premier ballet institution.

Her repertoire included traditional titles from world ballet: Swan Lake, Coppélia, Giselle, Grand Pas de Quatre; along with recognized works of the twentieth century: Les Sylphides, by Mikhail Fokin, Apollo, by George Balanchine, Lilac Garden, by Anthony Tudor; and works by Cuban choreographers: Carmen, Conjugación and Diógenes ante el tonel, by Alberto Alonso Rayneri; Paso a tres, by Alberto Méndez González; Estudios para cuatro, by Iván Tenorio and Electra Garrigó, by Gustavo Herrera.

At the II International Ballet Competition of Varna, Bulgaria, in 1966, she won the gold medal. She was the first Cuban to obtain the highest prize. In 1969, she received the silver medal at the I International Ballet Competition of Moscow and in 1970, she was awarded the Gold Star for best dancer at the VIII Dance Festival of the Champs Élysées in Paris for her interpretation of Mlle. Grahn in Grand Pas de Quatre.

Her work as a performer led her to perform in the Opera and Ballet theaters of Sofia and Stara Zagora in Bulgaria; in Kiev and Odessa in Ukraine and at the Bolshoi in Russia; at the Yalta Summer Festival; the Royal Danish Ballet; the Foundation of Stars in Paris; the Marseille Opera; the Ballet of the Teatro de Bellas Artes in Mexico; the Nice Opera; and the II World Ballet Festival of Japan.

In 1973 she was contracted by choreographer Roland Petit as prima ballerina of the National Ballets of Marseille, where she remained for five seasons. In this company she performed the repertoire of the French master: Etudes and Preludes, The Intermittencies of the Heart, Notre Dame de Paris, L'Arlésienne, Pink Floyd, Le Loup, Coppélia, Carmen, La rose malade (many of them as world premieres). She shared the stage with Maya Plisetskaya, Rudy Brians, Dennis Ganio, and Petit himself.

Another important collaboration was with Béjart Ballet Lausanne in Switzerland in 1989, where she taught classes and danced in the ballet Dionysus and in the world premiere of 1789 et nous.

Parallel to her performances in the most famous ballets, she has developed a distinguished career as a professor and ballet maître, begun in Cuba with the founding of the National School of Ballet in 1962 and continued with the most renowned companies and academies in the world such as: the Paris Opera, the Bolshoi Ballet of Moscow, the Royal Ballet of Denmark, the Royal Ballet of London, Béjart Ballet Lausanne, the National Dance Company of Mexico. In 2014 she is associate artistic director of the English National Ballet.

For Cuban ballet, Loipa Araújo premiered important contemporary repertoire pieces: Webern Opus 5, by Maurice Béjart, Etudes and Preludes and The Intermittencies of the Heart (pas de deux), by Roland Petit; the famous works of the nineteenth century: Festival of Flowers in Genzano, by Danish August Bournonville and Diana and Actaeon, by Franco-Russian Marius Petipa.

During her long career spanning more than four decades in ballet, she has received numerous decorations: the National Dance Prize, the Prize of the Gran Teatro de La Habana, the Félix Varela Order and the Medal of Merit for Dance from the Brazilian Dance Council.

She excelled equally as Swanilda in Coppélia, as the Woman in Blood Wedding, in the Latin American Revolution of 1789 et nous and the Battle in Giselle (filmed by the Cuban Institute of Film Art and Industry (ICAIC) in the film of the same name in 1963).

Loipa Araújo has been considered "an orchid in the garden of ballet," and after more than sixty years in dance, she is still sought after by schools and companies around the world.

In 2014 Loipa held the position of associate artistic director of the English National Ballet.

Loipa was married to Azari Plisetzki and later to film director Octavio Cortázar until his death.

Guest Artist:
1957 – Ballet Celeste, San Francisco
1957 – 59 – Greek Theatre of Los Angeles, United States
Ballet of the Opera and Ballet Theater of Sofia and Stara Zagora, Bulgaria
1970-76-81 – Ballets of Marseille (Roland Petit), France
1973 – Ballet of the Odessa and Kiev Opera
1975 – Bolshoi Ballet of Moscow and the Royal Danish Ballet
1976 – Ballet of the Teatro de Bellas Artes, Mexico City
1977 – Malygot Theatre of Leningrad, Soviet Union, Nice Opera, France, International Ballet of Caracas, Venezuela, International Ballet Festival of Lausanne, Switzerland
1979 – World Festival of Japan
1989 – Béjart Ballet of Lausanne, Switzerland
1990 – International Festival of Music and Dance of Palma de Mallorca, Spain
1991 – Edinburgh Festival, Great Britain
1992 – Melbourne Arts Festival, Australia

Guest Professor:
1973 – 76 and 1981 – The Ballets of Marseille by Roland Petit, France
1976 – Ballet of Bellas Artes, Mexico City
1977 – Marseille Opera, France
1988 – Chair of the Americas, Spain
1988 – 89 – Ballet of the Avignon Opera, France
1988 – 89 – Béjart Ballet Lausanne, Switzerland
1990 – 91 – 92 – Ballet of the Rome Opera, Italy
1992 – 93 – 94 – Ballet of the Grand Theatre of Bordeaux, France
1993 – 94 – 95 – 96 – 97 – 2000 and 2003 – Teatro alla Scala in Milan, Italy
1997 – 98 – Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, Argentina
1998 – 2004 – Ballet of the Paris Opera Theater, France
2000 – Ballet of Washington, United States
2001 – 2002 – Teatro Maggio Musicale Florentino, Italy
2001 – Teatro Communale di Firenze, Italy
2001 – 2002 – 2003 and 2004 – Association of Art and Culture of Buenos Aires, Argentina
2001 – 2005 – Royal Ballet of London, Great Britain
2003 – Teatro San Carlo in Naples, Italy
2003 – Ballet of the Municipal Theater of Santiago de Chile, Chile

Her Awards:
1990 Medal of the Brazilian Dance Council
1998 "Félix Varela" Order of the first degree. Council of State of Cuba
2000 Honorary Doctorate in Art, Superior Institute of Art of Cuba
2003 National Dance Prize, granted by the National Council of Scenic Arts of the Cuban Ministry of Culture and the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC)
Loipa-Mistress of Ballet

Pedagogue
1987 – Associate Senior Professor of the Faculty of Dance Art of the Superior Institute of Art of Cuba (I.S.A.)
1996 – Guest Professor of the International Dance Course sponsored by the "Alicia Alonso" Dance Chair of the Complutense University of Madrid
2000 – Honorary Doctor of ISA
2000 – 2005 Professor of the Summer Course of El Escorial. Alicia Alonso Superior Institute of Dance. Rey Juan Carlos I University, Spain

Jury:
2004 – Juror at the International Ballet Competition of Varna, Bulgaria
2005 – Juror at the Ballet Competition of Jackson, Mississippi, United States
Member of the admission jury of the Paris Opera Ballet, member of the Examining Commission of the ballet school of the Paris Opera Ballet, juror of the Benois Dance Prize and has also been president of the Association of Scenic Artists of UNEAC.

Her repertoire included traditional titles from world ballet:
Swan Lake
Coppélia
Giselle
Grand Pas de Quatre
Les Sylphides, by Mikhail Fokin
Apollo, by George Balanchine
Lilac Garden, by Anthony Tudor; and by Cuban choreographers
Carmen
Conjugación
Diógenes ante el tonel, by Alberto Alonso Rayneri
Paso a tres, by Alberto Méndez González
Estudios para cuatro, by Iván Tenorio
Electra Garrigó, by Gustavo Herrera
Etudes and Preludes
The Intermittencies of the Heart
Notre Dame de Paris
L'Arlésienne
Pink Floyd
Le Loup

An aspect of paramount importance is her pedagogical work, which she has developed simultaneously with her work as a performer. She also serves as director of the Chair of Choreography and Performance of the "Alicia Alonso" Superior Institute of Dance, attached to Rey Juan Carlos University in Madrid.

She currently constitutes one of the relevant personalities of Cuban culture.