Geneviève Gosselin

Geneviève-Adélaïde Gosselin (1791 – 1818) was a French ballet dancer known for being the first dancer en pointe.

Biography Early life Geneviève Gosselin was the daughter of a ballet master and was also the eldest sister of three other famous ballerinas of the Paris Opera Ballet. Her sister Constance Gosselin was the wife of the dancer Auguste-Anatole Petit. Another sibling, Louis-François Gosselin, was a premier dancer in London and Paris and her other sister, Henriette Gosselin, danced with the Paris Opera from 1821 to 1830.

Ballet career Geneviève studied under Jean-François Coulon, who was one of the most renowned teachers in Europe at the time. He became professor of the "classe de perfectionnement" at the Opéra de Paris in 1807

In 1815, she was cast as the heroine in Flore et Zéphire, one of the first romantic ballets of the time. The ballet was choreographed by Charles Didelot, the chief choreographer of the Russian Imperial Ballet. Didelot had created a "flying machine", instituting the use of cables and wires to give the appearance of weightlessness. Because of his invention, Geneviève Gosselin could perform in pointe shoes. This was the first appearance of dancers en pointe. Gosselin was only able to balance for brief moments on the pointe shoes (although one critic says that she balanced for one minute). and John Chapman noted the significance of Gosselin as Marie Taglioni's predecessor. Gosselin withdrew from the stage in 1816, coinciding with the retirement of Auguste Vestris. Geneviève Gosselin died at the in 1818, three years after her appearance en pointe.