In honor of the 90th anniversary of ballerina Maya Plisetskaya's birth, the Moscow government has named a square on Ulitsa Bolshaya Dmitrovka in her honor, the Moscow department of culture announced Friday.
Well-known artists and public figures attended the official opening of the central square, and Moscow's deputy mayor for social issues Leonid Pechatnikov said “she glorified the country. This square and this plaque is a token act for her birthday,” local news site Molnet.ru reported.
In 2013, one of the most well-known Brazilian street artists Eduardo Kobra painted a colorful mural of the ballerina on the side of a building abutting the square, as part of a citywide graffiti project.
A bronze plaque has now been affixed to the building with the following engraving — “Maya Plisetskaya Square is named after the outstanding Russian ballerina. Opened Nov. 20, 2015.”
Plisetskaya died of a heart attack in Germany on May 2, aged 89. She was a star of Moscow's Bolshoi ballet who overcame a legacy of Stalinist oppression to redefine her art and be feted as the greatest ballerina of her generation.
Plisetskaya had lived since 1991 in Munich, where she moved with her husband, composer Rodion Shedrin, following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
In a career spanning six decades, she gained international fame for a fiery, emotional style that contrasted with the more demure performances traditionally expected of ballerinas.
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