Encyclopedia Categories | Jewish Women's Archive

Anna Sokolow

Anna Sokolow (1910-2000), an American dancer and choreographer of Russian-Jewish descent, danced with the early Martha Graham Company and created many international dance-theater works of social and political significance.

Estelle Joan Sommers

Estelle Joan Sommers was a designer, entrepreneur, and executive who made her career in retail dancewear, introducing innovative designs for Capezio’s dance and exercise clothing.

Eva Sopher

Eva Sopher was a Brazilian-Jewish theater manager and cultural entrepreneur in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, where she worked for 41 years. Sopher is recognized for her leadership in the renovation of the world-renowned São Pedro Theatre and her contributions to Brazilian theater, art, and culture.

Phyllis Spira

As a young dancer at the Royal Ballet School in London, Phyllis Spira was on the brink of a successful career abroad, but in 1965 she returned to her home in South Africa and became the country's prima ballerina. Spira was awarded the Nederburg Prize for ballet in 1972 and 1979. Her most notable achievement was perhaps leading “Dance For All,” a program to provide disadvantaged students opportunities to dance.

Hanna Stiebel

Hanna Nosovsky Stiebel used her background in dance to create graceful, dynamic outdoor sculpture installations.

Rivka Sturman

Rivka Sturman was a pioneer in creating Israeli folk dance and established the style and character of the genre. Her goal was to culturally unite the immigrants who had come to Palestine but had retained the dances of their old nations. For forty years she choreographed the development of Israeli folk dance and spearheaded programs to help it become a part of Israel’s national identity.

Helen Tamiris

Helen Tamiris was a leader in forming American modern dance. An acclaimed choreographer and director, she used dance to comment on the social issues of her day, including racism, poverty, and war.

Sydney Taylor

Sydney Taylor as the author of the beloved All-of-a-Kind Family chapter book series, about five memorable and distinctive sisters growing up in a warm and loving Jewish household in early twentieth-century New York.

Victoria Marks

Victoria Marks (b. 1956) is an American dancer, choreographer, professor, and activist. Marks began dancing as a child and later expanded her career as the founder of Victoria Marks Performance Company and a professor at various conservatories around the world. She is also an advocate for mental health and accessibility, collaborating on films that investigate the effects of mental illness and founding the Dancing Disability Lab at UCLA in 2014.

Margarethe Wallmann

Although trained in classical ballet, Margarethe Wallmann chose to study and teach Middle-European Expressionist dance. She continued to create award-winning works that explored Austrian culture until Nazi occupation ousted her from her position and she was forced to Buenos Aires and later Milan, where she continued to create acclaimed ballet and opera productions.

Cilli Wang

From childhood, Cilli Wang was known as the “Pavlova of Parody” for her experimentation with movement based on spoken word. Even when the Anschluss forced her to flee her home country of Austria, she continued developing dance and speech performances in the Netherlands.

Berta Yampolsky

Berta Yampolsky was dancer, choreographer, and artistic director. With her husband Hillel Markman, she founded the Israel Ballet.

Yaffa Yarkoni

Yaffa Yarkoni was a talented and influential Israeli singer who recorded over 1,400 songs throughout her career. Known for her deep and throaty voice, her music spanned an impressive array of styles and rhythms and marked a shift in Israeli popular music.

Ruth Ziv-Ayal

Ruth Ziv-Ayal, a director and choreographer, is a pioneer in Israeli experimental movement theater. Her early work was characterized by the use of everyday materials such as household tools, newspapers, and balls, while her later work expanded to use materials such as soil, sand, water, bread, and clothing.

Elsa Zylberstein

During the last two decades of the twentieth century, French cinema displayed an extraordinary wealth of young Jewish talents, such as Elsa Zylberstein. Zylberstein is an internationally acclaimed French film and stage actress with a strong commitment to humanitarian awareness and advocating for women’s welfare.

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The Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women

Performing Arts: Dance