Michaela DePrince: Who she was and her importance in the world of dance.

By: Niamh Thompson

Michaela DePrince recently died at the age of 29. She was born in Kenema, Sierra Leone and was brought up in an orphanage after rebels killed her father and her mother died of starvation and a fever.

DePrince was born with vitiligo, a condition that causes patches of skin to lose its colour. People in her hometown viewed vitiligo as a curse of the devil leaving her to be abandoned at an orphanage by her uncle, where she received abuse and taunts, having been labeled as ‘the devil’s child’.

She was first exposed to ballet after seeing a magazine at the orphanage blown against the gate, depicting a poised ballerina en pointe. For her, the photo encompassed hope in which DePrince dreamed to become the ballerina she saw. She was later adopted by a family in the US, and by the age of 17, she had been featured in a documentary film and performed on “Dancing with the Stars.’ Her adoptive parents supported her passion for ballet and enrolled her at the Rock School for Dance Education in Philadelphia and the Jacqueline

Kennedy Onassis School at the American Ballet Theatre. Afterwards, DePrince had been featured in dance companies all over the world, ranging from a guest principal at the Joburg Buller in South Africa, the Dance Theatre in Harlem, and the Dutch National Junior Company in the Netherlands. Through these ventures, DePrince worked tirelessly to overcome the stereotypes tied to conventional beauty and racial barriers within the world of ballet.

Not only has DePrince been called an inspiration to aspiring dancers, but her humanitarian eYorts have also been noticed globally. In 2016, she was named an Ambassador for War Child Holland, and then she hosted a gala called ‘Dare to Dream’. The aim of this was to empower the children affected by armed conflict to ignite them with a passion in prioritizing their mental health and to highlight that these circumstances don’t have to define who they grow up to me. DePrince then later co-authored her autobiographical book ‘Taking Flight: From War Orphan to Star Ballerina’ with her mother, Elaine DePrince.

Michaela DePrince has affected copious lives and will forever be remembered as someone who belonged on the stage and took the world into her own palms, shaping many of our rustic ideas as members of the ballet world.