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Linda Rabin

b. 1946

by Michael Brown

A dancer, choreographer and teacher, Canadian Linda Rabin is also the co-founder of Linda Rabin Danse Moderne in Montreal. She is shown here in the spring of 2002.

Photographer: Josh Rabin

In Brief

Linda Rabins’s education and career as a dancer, teacher, and choreographer was global and eclectic, making her a unique dance artist. Born in Montreal, she studied modern dance with Jose Limon, Anna Sokolow, and members of the Martha Graham Ensemble. She also studied Asian forms of dance theatre in Japan, Bali, India, and Nepal, and the healing arts and somatic education. From 1968 to 1973, Rabin lived in Israel performing, teaching, and choreographing with the Lia Schubert Company. Rabin was the co-founder and long-time co-director of Linda Rabin Danse Moderne in Montréal, which evolved into Les Ateliers de Danse Moderne de Montréal (LADMMI). Rabin is a certified practitioner of Body-Mind Centering and an authorized teacher of Continuum Movement and Jungle Gym Workout.

Article

A dancer, choreographer and teacher, Rabin had an unusually eclectic education. Born in Montreal, she studied modern dance in the United States, chiefly with Jose Limon (1908–1972), Anna Sokolow, and members of the Martha Graham Ensemble at New York’s Juilliard School of Music (BFA, 1967) and at the Martha Graham School. She has also studied Kagura, Noh, Okinawa dance, and Asian forms of dance theatre in Japan, Bali, India, and Nepal, and the healing arts and somatic education in the United States and Canada.

Rabin’s career as a teacher and choreographer has been as varied as her preparation. From 1968 to 1973, she lived in Israel performing, teaching, and choreographing, mostly with the Lia Schubert Company in Haifa. In 1973–1974, she was a rehearsal director with the Ballet Rambert in London, England. Since 1974, she has been a free-lance teacher and choreographer based in Canada. In 2019, she was named to the Order of Canada as a Member.

Rabin’s choreographed works have been widely performed in Canada by les Grands Ballets Canadiens and the Triskelian Dance Foundation in Montreal and by other companies from coast to coast, in the Netherlands and China, and in Israel by the A voluntary collective community, mainly agricultural, in which there is no private wealth and which is responsible for all the needs of its members and their families.Kibbutz Dance Company in Nahariyya, the Batsheva Dance Company in Tel Aviv, and the Haifa Municipal Theatre. She has taught at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, l'Université de Québec in Montreal, York University in Toronto, and the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem, and she has conducted workshops across Canada and in Japan, England, France, Austria, and Guatemala.

Most of Rabin’s teaching efforts, however, have been devoted to Linda Rabin Danse Moderne in Montréal, which evolved into les Ateliers de Danse Moderne de Ateliers de Danse Moderne de Montréal (LADMMI), of which she was the co-founder and long-time co-director. Since 1992, she has become interested in studying, researching, and training in the areas of the healing arts and somatic education. She has been a certified practitioner of Body-Mind Centering since 1998 and an authorized teacher of Continuum Movement and Jungle Gym Workout since 2001.

Rabin is the daughter of Max Rabin (1917–1993), a Montreal native who worked as a clothing salesman and importer, and Mina (née Rosen) Rabin (1922–1982), a homemaker, who was born in Bialystok, Poland, and immigrated to Canada at the age of nine. Her parents were married in 1940. She has one brother, Joshua Zalman Rabin (b. 1942).

Bibliography

Lindgren, Allana. "Interview with Linda Rabin." (2011).

Fortin, Sylvie, Ninoska Gomez, Yvan Joly, and Linda Rabin. "Conversations about the somatic basis of spiritual experiences." In Dance, Somatics and Spiritualities: Contemporary Sacred Narratives. Intellect Books: 2015, 261-282.

Ruble, Blair A. "Moving center stage: Dance and Modernization in Late Twentieth-Century Montreal." Сучасне мистецтво 14 (2018): 69-82.

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How to cite this page

Brown, Michael. "Linda Rabin." Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women. 27 February 2009. Jewish Women's Archive. (Viewed on October 7, 2024) <https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/rabin-linda>.