Dalcroze Eurhythmics in the Argentine Republic: its introduction and the history of professional artistic education from 1938 to the present Lilia Beatriz Sánchez (Argentina)
The roots of eurhythmics in Argentina: Madame Sirouyan Professor Lía Nercessian de Sirouyan arrived in Buenos Aires in 19381. Since then, the discipline of eurhythmics has had a journey of many ups and downs, and the furthering of eurhythmics education continues to this day.
Many generations of musicians, actors, dancers, and teachers were trained in her classes. To her, we owe the solid foundation of eurhythmics in Argentina which, despite the turbulence of the country’s political-educational history and the void her departure left us, is presently growing. 2
Lía Nercessian de Sirouyan began eurhythmics classes at an early age. 2 These experiences marked her: she began her professional training in Paris, where she met “Monsieur Jaques,” who advised her to move to l’Institute Jaques Dalcroze in Geneva (IJD) to obtain the international certificate. While there, she obtained the second prize in Plastique Animée (Von Brunow, 1978).
Letter from Jaques-Dalcroze to Madame in Paris, 1931. AjdAR Archives
Professional courses 19291930. Geneva. In the photo, E. JaquesDalcroze, Lía Nercessian de Sirouyan and Frank Martin.
Letter from Jaques-Dalcroze to Madame in Buenos Aires, 1943. AjdAR
Original in possession of her family.
Archives
Despite the physical distance, Professor Sirouyan kept a correspondence with her teacher, who appreciated and recognized the work that had first been carried out in Paris, then later in Argentina. Sirouyan’s foreign accent, talent, and austere elegance earned her the respectful nickname of “Madame” among colleagues and students during her long years of activity, until her death in 2002.
1
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She accompanied her husband Ashot Artzuní, an Armenian journalist, historian, and author of History of the Armenian People.
2
Born in 1908 in Baku, in present-day Azerbaijan, of Russian nationality and Armenian ethnicity, she had her first contact with eurhythmics as a child in her native city, in the classes taught by teachers coming from the Eurhythmics School of Moscow. After surviving the pogroms with her family, they went into exile in Europe where, at the age of twelve, she took eurhythmics classes for two years in a boarding school for children in London. (Sirouyan, 1991)
DALCROZE CONNECTIONS • WINTER 2021 VOL.6, NO.1 • WWW.DALCROZEUSA.ORG • LATIN AMERICAN ISSUE, PART 1 (ENGLISH)
