Dance Magazine Awards Go to Williams, Marks and Holmes, and Bessy; Cortez Gets Citation

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NEW YORK CITY -- The Dance Magazine Awards, an institution in the dance world since I 1954, this year go to Claude Bessy, Bruce Marks and Anna-Marie Holmes, and Dudley Williams, Dance Magazine editor in chief Richard Philp announced. A special citation goes to Hernando Cortez and Dancers Responding to AIDS. The awards will be presented May 5 at the Asia Society in New York City. This year's winners represent a wide spectrum of what superb dancemakers can do as performers, teachers, directors, and activists to shape the art's history.

The Dance Magazine Award honors significant contributions to dance. Dance Magazine editors and correspondents from around the world submit nominations, with a panel of senior editors selecting the awardees. This year's recipients were chosen by a panel chaired by senior editor Clive Barnes and including Philp, Doris Hering, Marilyn Hunt, Robert Greskovic, Hilary Ostlere, and Tobi Tobias.

CLAUDE BESSY

Claude Bessy is the director of the Paris Opera Ballet School.

Only a few years after she joined POB, Bessy drew the attention of some of the century's leading choreographers. In 1947 George Balanchine noticed her beauty, grace, and suppleness and gave her solos in Le Palais de cristal (Symphony in C) and Serenade. Serge Lifar displayed her brilliance in Les Mirages in 1954 and in Chemin de …