Sonia Serova (April 15, 1888 – May 9, 1943), born Eileen Mary Swepstone, was a British-born American modern dancer, also known as Eileen West and Eileen Kiefer. She taught dance in New York City, and published several dance education manuals, including three manuals for the dance education of very young children.
Early life and education
Eileen M. Swepstone was born in London, the daughter of Harry Albemarle Swepstone and Emma Hough Swepstone.[1] She attended Mrs. Wordsworth's School in London,[2][3] and studied dance with Veronine Vestoff at the University of California in 1916.[4][5]
Career
Sonia Serova, from a 1926 newspaper
As Eileen Swepstone, she acted and danced in local theatre productions in British Columbia in 1912,[6] 1913,[7][8] 1914,[9][10] and 1916.[11] She danced with partner Bernard Tweedale[12] in theatres in the Pacific Northwest, including in Alaska,[13] and wrote an instructional pamphlet on the tango.[14] She began teaching children ballet and performing in San Francisco by 1916.[15][16]
Using the Russian-sounding name "Sonia Serova", she and her first husband founded the Vestoff-Serova Russian School of Dancing in New York City in 1917.[4][17] Serova was noted especially for teaching very young children in her classes, "as early as four years, but never younger".[18][19] "The only way to get anything out of a baby is to be a baby oneself, and so I just play I'm about four years old when teaching the Tinies," she explained in her book, Baby Work.[4]
Technique of Toe Dancing: A Graded Text Book for Students on Pointes (1934)
Personal life and legacy
Swepstone married fellow dancer Charles West, also known as Veronine Vestoff, in 1917. They had a daughter, Cynthia, born in 1918. She died in 1943, in High Bridge, New Jersey.[1] The Serova School of Dance in Somerville, New Jersey, was opened by her daughter in 1954.[28][29]
