Angela Isadora Duncan (May 26, 1877, or May 27, 1878[a] – September 14, 1927) was an American-born dancer and choreographer, who was a pioneer of modern contemporary dance and performed to great acclaim throughout Europe and the United States.

Although he avoided prison time, Isadora's mother (angered over his infidelities as well as the financial scandal) divorced him, and from then on the family struggled with poverty.

[3] Joseph Duncan, along with his third wife and their daughter, died in 1898 when the British passenger steamer SS Mohegan ran aground off the coast of Cornwall.

[8] Duncan's novel approach to dance had been evident since the classes she had taught as a teenager, where she "followed [her] fantasy and improvised, teaching any pretty thing that came into [her] head".

This took Duncan all over Europe as she created new works using her innovative technique,[16] which emphasized natural movement in contrast to the rigidity of traditional ballet.

[18] Despite mixed reaction from critics, Duncan became quite popular for her distinctive style and inspired many visual artists, such as Antoine Bourdelle, Dame Laura Knight, Auguste Rodin, Arnold Rönnebeck, André Dunoyer de Segonzac, and Abraham Walkowitz, to create works based on her.

Desti, who also appeared in Moonchild (as "Lisa la Giuffria") and became a member of Crowley's occult order,[b] later wrote a memoir of her experiences with Duncan.

Isadora Duncan, wearing a Greek evening gown designed by Poiret,[23] danced on tables among 300 guests; 900 bottles of champagne were consumed until the first light of day.

[23] Duncan disliked the commercial aspects of public performance, such as touring and contracts, because she felt they distracted her from her real mission, namely the creation of beauty and the education of the young.

[25] It was a boarding school that in addition to a regular education, also taught dance but the students were not expected or even encouraged to be professional dancers.

Duncan had planned to leave the United States in 1915 aboard the RMS Lusitania on its ill-fated voyage, but historians believe her financial situation at the time drove her to choose a more modest crossing.

[34] In 1924, Duncan composed a dance routine called Varshavianka to the tune of the Polish revolutionary song known in English as Whirlwinds of Danger.

[42] Following this tragedy, Duncan spent several months on the Greek island of Corfu with her brother and sister, then several weeks at the Viareggio seaside resort in Italy with actress Eleonora Duse.

In her autobiography, Duncan relates that in her deep despair over the deaths of her children, she begged a young Italian stranger, the sculptor Romano Romanelli, to sleep with her because she was desperate for another child.

[46] Later on, in 1921, after the end of the Russian Revolution, Duncan moved to Moscow, where she met the poet Sergei Yesenin, who was eighteen years her junior.

Two years later, on December 28, 1925, he was found dead in his room in the Hotel Angleterre in Leningrad (formerly St Petersburg and Petrograd), in an apparent suicide.

However, the claim of a purported relationship made after Duncan’s death by de Acosta (a controversial figure for her alleged relations) is in dispute.

He would speak of how memorable it was, but all that Zelda recalled was that while all eyes were watching Duncan, she was able to steal the salt and pepper shakers from the table.

[56] On September 14, 1927, in Nice, France, Duncan was a passenger in an Amilcar CGSS automobile owned by Benoît Falchetto [fr], a French-Italian mechanic.

She wore a long, flowing, hand-painted silk scarf, created by the Russian-born artist Roman Chatov, a gift from her friend Mary Desti, the mother of American filmmaker Preston Sturges.

"); but according to the American novelist Glenway Wescott, Desti later told him that Duncan's actual parting words were, "Je vais à l'amour" ("I am off to love").

"According to dispatches from Nice, Duncan was hurled in an extraordinary manner from an open automobile in which she was riding and instantly killed by the force of her fall to the stone pavement.

Her will was the first of a Soviet citizen to undergo probate in the U.S.[64] Duncan was cremated, and her ashes were placed next to those of her children[65] in the columbarium at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.

When the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées was built, Duncan's likeness was carved in its bas-relief over the entrance by sculptor Antoine Bourdelle and included in painted murals of the nine muses by Maurice Denis in the auditorium.

Garland was such a fan that she later lived in a building erected at the same site and address as Duncan, attached a commemorative plaque near the entrance, which is still there as of 2016[update].

Garland also succeeded in having San Francisco rename an alley on the same block from Adelaide Place to Isadora Duncan Lane.