Ausdance ACT - Floeur Alder Floorebarre & Contemporary Workshop 2026 Australian Dance Week

Expand your horizon of movement this Australian Dance Week with acclaimed artist and educator Floeur Alder. Join Floeur in a fun and friendly class to explore new forms of motion and find flexibility at your level. 

Floorbarre - a combination of yoga and classical ballet on the floor, to increase strength, flexibility and rotation. Exercises can also be used in everyday life.  

Contemporary – a basic technique class adjusted to suit various levels of experience. This includes floorwork, travelling sequences and applying creative elements from the performance ‘Djilba’ at the conclusion of the session. 

The Floorbarre technique has an international lineage and was passed down from her mother the late Lucette Alodous AC who together with her husband Alan Alder laid the foundations of the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts Dance Department (WAAPA). 

Floorebarre is taught exclusively in Australia by Floeur, one of only a handful of practitioners worldwide.

This workshop is accessible for ages over ten years and older people that have some dance or yoga experience. The Floorebarre can help people recovering from injury and generally in their everyday lives. 

“I’m looser now at 70 years old than I was at 18 thanks to the Floorbarre”.  
Lucette Aldous AC 

“Before she passed in 2021 Lucette and myself did the Floorbarre everyday as a warmup and at 48 years old it has helped me to still be able to perform at a peak level”. Floeur Alder 

“Lucette Aldous passed on Floor Barre to my teacher Joanne Priest OBE and it formed an essential part of the start of every class and no doubt aided in the longevity of my career”. Cathy Adamek 

Join us afterwards at the National Film and Screen Archive for the screening of POINTE: Dancing on a Knife's Edge + Q&A | National Film and Sound Archive - a powerful documentary focusing on the life of Floeur Alder, the daughter of renowned ballet dancers Lucette Aldous and Alan Alder. 

Floeur Alder holds an Advanced Diploma in Dance (1998) and a Bachelor of Performing Arts (2003) from the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA). In 2000, she received a Creative Development Fellowship to study with leading contemporary companies across Europe, enriching her artistic and teaching practice. 

Since 2002, Floeur has taught ballet and contemporary dance across high schools, fulltime studio programs, WAAPA, West Australian Ballet, Ochre Contemporary Dance Company, Tasdance, Gary Lang’s NT Dance Company, and as a guest teacher nationwide. Encouraged by her mother, Lucette Aldous AC, she was awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 2011, travelling with Lucette to study at major international ballet institutions including the Paris Opera Ballet School, the Royal Danish School, the Perm Ballet Academy, and The Royal Ballet. This experience deepened her technical expertise and strengthened her commitment to preserving and sharing classical knowledge within the Australian dance community. She continues to honour her parents’ legacy at WAAPA through her work with firstyear students, Link Dance Company, and Aboriginal mentoring in classical ballet. 

Alongside her teaching career, Floeur has performed with Leigh Warren and Dancers, Tasdance, STRUT Dance, Ochre Contemporary Dance Company, and NT Dance Company. As an independent choreographer, she has created works for Ochre, West Australian Ballet, and her own projects. Her 2019 work Djilba (Spring) – A Moment in Time, created with artist Virginia Ward, has toured widely across Western Australia. 

Floeur’s contributions have been recognised with the 2006 WA Ausdance Award for Most Outstanding Achievement in Choreography for Rare Earth. She has been named a “Dancer to Watch” by The West Australian, voted Australia’s Most Interesting Independent Artist (Dance Australia, 2018), and nominated for Best Female Performer at the 2019 WA Performing Arts Awards for Beyond by Chrissie Parrott. 

In 2025, the documentary Pointe Dancing on a Knife’s Edge, exploring Floeur’s life and family legacy, premiered at CinefestOZ before screening at Luna Cinemas and touring nationally. 

Boris Kniaseff trained at the Bolshoi School in Moscow before moving to Paris in 1948, where he noticed gymnasts warming up extensively before training. After contracting polio and temporarily losing the use of his legs, he spent three years in Switzerland studying with a yoga guru and regained his mobility. This experience inspired him to merge yoga principles with classical ballet on the floor, removing the challenge of gravity and making technique safer and more accessible. 

Returning to Paris, he taught this new Floorbarre method to dancers of all levels—from Paris Opera stars like Rudolf Nureyev to complete beginners. When students began injuring themselves by practising unsupervised, he restructured the method in the late 1960s with input from medical professionals, gymnasts, and yoga experts, ensuring it was safe and injuryfree. He insisted it never be recorded; like Sanskrit or Paris Opera training, it must be passed down directly from teacher to student. 

Today, only Lucette Aldous AC and I are authorised to teach this technique in Australia, and only a small number of teachers worldwide have been entrusted with it. Floorbarre improves flexibility, strength, rotation, and energy through breathbased work rooted in yoga as well as ballet. As Lucette Aldous AC said, “I’m looser now at 70 years old than I was at 18 thanks to the Floorbarre.” 

Lucette and I both studied in Paris with Robert Bestonso, former Paris Opera star and student of Kniaseff. I began Floorbarre at age seven, as Lucette required me to train in it for a year before starting classical barre work. Until her passing in 2021, Lucette and I practised Floorbarre daily, and at 48 it continues to support my ability to perform at a high level. 

Floorbarre is suitable for anyone over ten and for older adults with some dance or yoga experience. It supports injury recovery and enhances everyday movement. 

Floeur Alder