At a chic ceremony in the Residence of France, ambassador Pierre-André Imbert awarded the insignia of  Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters to dance artist Elizabeth Cameron Dalman on Tuesday evening.

Artist-curator Tony Albert, currently artistic director for the National Gallery’s 5th National Indigenous Art Triennial, was likewise recognised.

Dalman, named 2015 Canberra CityNews Artist of the Year for her vital work in this city and region, has enjoyed a distinguished career in Europe and Australia, having founded the Australian Dance Theatre and later the Mirramu Dance Centre on Lake George.

While in her 80s, she toured the world as the mother of the Prince in Irish choreographer Michael Keegan-Dolan’s Swan Lake/ loch na hEala, a radical updating of Swan Lake.

While plainly thrilled with the honour, Dalman declared herself a little bit mystified, as her strongest French connection is through her late husband, the photographer Jan Dalman, who was mime artist Marcel Marceau’s chosen snapper.

In 2018 Elizabeth and her son Andreas published a book in French and English, called Out of Silence: Marcel Marceau by Jan Dalman featuring 75 photographs captured from the wings.

Another connection, she said, is that in 1968 when she took the fledgling Australian Dance Theatre to Europe; it was only through the intervention of the French ambassador in Italy that she was able to negotiate a key European tour.

“As dancers, we rarely work alone,” Dalman says: “I feel that I accept this honour for all dancers… Arts are more important today than ever because before because of our volatile changing world. Arts help keep people together.”