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Isadora Duncan

Isadora Duncan (May 26, 1878 - September 19, 1927) was an American dancer.

- Isadora Duncan -

Born Dora Angela Duncanon in San Francisco, California, she is considered the Mother of Modern Dance. Although never very popular in the United States, she entertained throughout Europe, and moved to Paris, France in 1900. There, she lived at the apartment hotel at no. 9, rue Delambre in Montparnasse in the midst of the growing artistic community gathered there. She told friends that in the summer she used to dance in the nearby Luxembourg Garden[?], the most popular park in Paris, when it opened at five in the morning.

She flaunted traditional mores and morality, and her private life was subject to considerable scandal, especially following the tragic drowning of her children in the Seine River. However, Montparnasse's developing Bohemian environment did not suit her, and in 1909, she moved to two large apartments at 5 Rue Danton where she lived on the ground floor and used the first floor for her dance school. She danced ballet and gained a wide following that allowed her to set up a school to teach. She became so famous that she inspired artists and authors to create sculpture, jewelry, poetry, novels,photographs, watercolors, prints and paintings. When the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées was built in 1913, her face was carved in the bas-relief[?] by sculptor Antoine Bourdelle and painted in the murals by Maurice Denis[?].

She wore scarves which trailed behind her so that it caused her death in a freak accident in Nice, France when she was strangled by her scarf when it caught in the wheel of her friend's Bugatti automobile. As the driver sped off, the long cloth tightened around her neck and wrapped around the vehicle's axle. Ms. Duncan was yanked violently from the car and dragged for several yards before the driver realized what had happened. She died almost instantly from a broken neck.

Her life story was made into a movie, Isadora, in 1968.

Isadora Duncan is buried with her two children in Pere Lachaise Cemetery, Paris, France.



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