Alla Sizova

Alla Sizova (22 September 1939 – 23 November 2014) was a Russian ballet dancer, best known for her work with the Kirov Ballet. She was one of the four superstar ballerinas of the Soviet Union along with Natalia Makarova, Alla Osipenko and Irina Kolpakova, as well as the preferred dance partner of Rudolf Nureyev before his defection.

After the war, Sizova studied at the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet, where she was taught by Natalia Kamkova.

Despite the success of their partnership for the Kirov Ballet, Sizova and Nureyev both felt it necessary to bring their families to live with them in their apartment (which they were forced to share) and act as a buffer. The Kirov recognised her talent of musicality and vulnerability, and gave her the leading part in Igor Belsky's balletic setting of Shostakovich's Leningrad Symphony.

Acclaim Amongst other roles, Sizova received great acclaim as Princess Aurora in the 1964 Kirov production Tchaikovsky's The Sleeping Beauty opposite Yuri Soloviev.

Nureyev is rumoured to have said in his later years that Sizova was the only thing that could conceivably entice him back to the Soviet Union.

Sizova was awarded the Soviet Union's highest artistic honour, the People's Artist of the USSR in 1983.