A Time to Dance

Yudit Kayatsky

On a rainy afternoon in November I spent two enjoyable hours dancing with Yudit Kayatsky at Penrith School of Arts. It was neither ballroom dancing nor disco but something much more basic—this was Israeli folk dancing.

Folk dancing in Israel is new—it had its beginnings as recently as 1938 or 1940. Its impetus grew following the establishment of Israel as a nation in 1948 when the people of the diaspora, returning to Israel, brought dance forms from many countries. So Israeli folk dancing has been influenced by European, Arabic and even South American folk dancing until it has developed a form that encompasses them all.

Notable among its founders was Rivka Sturman who migrated to Palestine in 1929. Her background in modern dance helped her to choreograph and teach new dances and between 1942 and 1983 she created, taught and performed more than ninety dances. She died in 2001 at the age of 98. Rivka's photograph appears at the foot of this page.

Yudit Kayatsky, has been living in Australia for the past thirty years. She has taught Israeli dance to children at the Steiner school for two or three years, and to adults at Leura for the past eighteen months. She also enjoys an international blend of folk dancing with influences from Bulgaria, The Balkans, Turkey and Armenia. In this she participates as a dancer, not a teacher. She is a member of U3A's bush walking group.

Yudit's engaging, friendly personality, and her love for this dance form, enable her to communicate ideas in such a way that even the simple steps we learned as beginners made the workshop an enjoyable experience. I was sorry when the music stopped:  my feet wanted to keep dancing even if my brain ran into an occasional roadblock.

Will there be another workshop? I hope so. It will depend on the number of people who want to take part. If you would like to discuss it with Yudit or if you have any other questions about Israeli folk dancing you can get her phone number from U3A's Penrith office by CLICKING HERE.

Dancing at U3A

Rivka Sturman

Dancing at U3A