By arts editor Helen Musa

A dancer with a remarkable family history and a horrifying tale to tell is at the centre of Ausdance ACT’s Australian Dance Week celebrations, the biggest in the country.

Floeur Alder, 48, is the daughter and only child of the late ballerina Lucette Aldous, famous for partnering Rudolf Nureyev, and ballet dancer Alan Alder.

He was born in Canberra, the son of a chef at Parliament House, and trained here in Scottish highland dancing before a scholarship took him to the Royal Academy of Dance and then to the Royal Ballet.

Following illustrious careers on the boards, her parents founded the dance program at the WA Academy of Performing Arts and, in 2004, were recognised as WA State Living Treasures.

“Mum wanted me to be a pianist or a vet,” she tells me by phone from Perth. “They never forced me into dance. It was my choice.

“I am so grateful to have them as parents – famous, but extraordinary people. They had so much knowledge, which they trusted me with. I couldn’t be more grateful.

“Many fellow dancers had a lot of opinions and judgments. It was very hard in that way and it made me not want to be compared with mum. I trained in classical dance and I teach their work, but I had to take a different path.”

Floeur studied dance at WAAPA, then took a gap year during which she won a fellowship to study overseas, three months of dance heaven, visiting Netherlands Dance Theatre, Ballet Rambert and Ballet Frankfurt. It was no disadvantage that her mother knew “Billy” – William Forsythe, the legendary director of Ballet Frankfurt and The Forsythe Company.

Then, suddenly, it was almost all over.

She had just moved to Highgate, in inner-suburban Perth when, walking home at night, she was punched in the face and stabbed in the shoulder with a steak knife. She still has no idea what prompted the attack, and the perpetrator has never been caught.

“It missed my vein but cut facial arteries and muscles in my shoulder. I have staples in my neck and I can still feel it pulling,” she tells me.

Fainter-hearted people might have abandoned dance altogether, but she was back dancing within a year.

“All I wanted to do was dance, so when I was wheeled into the operation I asked: ‘Will I dance again?’ I’ve had 26 years of therapy, but it made me deal with a lot of stuff I had to deal with,” she says.

“I know it sounds weird, but I say I probably wouldn’t have my life any other way.”

Years of hard work led to her receiving a Churchill Fellowship in 2012, taking her on a nine-week trip to Russia, Denmark and England, with her mother tagging along to show her old haunts.

Her career has seen her perform with contemporary dance companies including Leigh Warren and Dancers, Tasdance, Strut Dance, Ochre Contemporary Dance Company and NT Dance Company, but now in 2026, she’s focusing on Dance Week and the Canberra connection.

“Dad was born here, you know. I have a lot of family and spent many Christmases in Canberra when I was a child,” she says. “But strangely, I hadn’t been there for 15 years until last year, when we presented the film Pointe at Dendy during its east coast premiere.”

It is the feature-length film Pointe, screening at the NFSA on May 3, that will probably attract the greatest public interest in Dance Week. That’s the prediction of Ausdance ACT director Cathy Adamek, who, after seeing it last year and meeting Floeur and director Dawn Jackson, discovered her ACT family dance roots.

The film is likely to attract ballet aficionados, weaving together performance footage, personal moments and even drawing on footage of Aldous performing Aurora with Margot Fonteyn.

Floeur’s floor barre workshop at Gorman Arts Centre on May 3 focuses on a seated technique taught by her mother, which emphasises light, flexible rotation and strengthening, good for injury prevention.

At Mirramu on Lake George on May 2, Floeur will perform Djilba: A Moment in Time, created with sculptor and writer Virginia Ward celebrating Menang Noongar season of transition, and is dedicated to her late father.

Dance Week celebrations reflect the fact, as reported by Adamek, that Canberra is home to the highest number of dance schools in the country.

Events include a launch on top of Mt Ainslie, street dancing, a networking morning tea and free dance classes across Canberra.

Full Dance Week details at ausdanceact.org.au.