Deborah Bertonoff

Devorah Bertonov (1915-2010)

Born in Tbilisi, Georgia, to Miriam and Yehoshua Bartonov, who were among the founders of the Jewish Habima Theater in Moscow.

Bertonov began studying dance at the Bolshoi School at age 8, where she later also studied pantomime. In 1928 her family immigrated to Palestine with Habima. That same year, she danced the Beggars’ Dance from The Dybbuk in a party held by Bialik, a dance that remained in the theater’s repertoire for many years.

In 1929 Bertonov moved to Berlin to train in the Trümpy-Skoronel Dance School, where she studied modern and classical ballet, as well as Balinese dance and percussion with composer Carl Orff. Upon her return to Israel she staged a recital with her father’s instruction. In 1933, Thelma Yellin and Emil Hauser invited Bertonov to study modern dance in their newly founded conservatory in Jerusalem. In 1935 she moved to England, where she trained in Kurt Jooss’s and Sigurd Leeder’s dance school in Darlington Hall, Devon. In 1936, she won an international dance contest in Paris, and on that same year she went on a tour in the Baltic countries with her own solo choreographies, including Characters in a Wedding and The First Prom.

In 1943, Bertonov began teaching silent acting and movement for actors in Habima’s studio. The following year, she opened her own dance studio in Tel Aviv, which later moved to Holon, where she lived. During this period she refined her approach to dance and choreography and created works staged and performed in Israel and worldwide.
In 1950, Bertonov began writing dance-related articles for Davar daily. She also studied tribal dances and went on trips in Ghana and India on a research grant from UNESCO. Her research continued for some forty years, and yielded the following books: Dancing to the Ground: Journey in Ghana (1964), Dancing to the Horizons: Journey in India (1973), and Journey to the World of Dance (1983) (all in Hebrew). She also held lectures accompanied with demonstrations of folk, ethnic, religious and national dances, first at Haifa University and then all around Israel, as well as in Los Angeles and New York.

Bertonov stepped off the stage in 1970 to concentrate on teaching in her studio in Holon, research, writing and lecturing. She was also a member of various artistic committees, including Batsheva’s public council. In 1979 she was commissioned to choreograph Recollections of a People for the company.
In 1989 she resumed her dancing activity when she reenacted the Beggars Dance in an international convention in New York. In 1994 she danced the duet with Ido Museri at the initiative of director and choreographer Daniela Michaeli in the Israeli Curtains Up (Haramat Masach) dance festival. In 1996 she performed in the Teatronetto Festival in the autobiographic one-person play A Sack of Longing.

In 2003, a documentary on Bertonov’s life directed by Dan and Noit Geva, was screened. In 2005, her autobiography was published in Hebrew.
Bertonov was the recipient of numerous awards and credits, including the Israel Prize for Dance (1991), Israel Union of Performing Arts (IUPA) Award (1992), and Treasured Citizen of Holon (1994).

Devorah Bertonov passed away in 2010.