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Dai Ailian, a legendary ballerina
 Some of the performances were inspired by real life during the
War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression (1937-1945), and burned with
patriotism. For instance, Dongjiang River was about a story in which a
woman risks her life to transport medicine to the frontline under heavy bombing
from enemy planes.
The dances of Dai Ailian created a strong and wide response. In 1946, at the
gatherings of frontier music and dancing in Chongqing,
Tianjin,
and Shanghai,
Dai Ailian performed a number of national dances she had created. The public
referred to her as a sower of seeds and the "first person to tap the heritage
left by the ancestors." Today, a historical evaluation on that grand activity is
found in the entry for Dai Ailian in the Chinese Encyclopedia: "Not only did she
help the folk dances of various ethnic groups in China get onto the modem stage,
but she also launched a popularization campaign of folk dances."
 Founder of modern Chinese
dancing
 In the following years, Dai choreographed, performed, and
taught dance in China. She was named principal of the Beijing Dancing School
when it was first set up in 1954.
After the founding of New China in 1949, Dai Ailian's artistic path became
even wider. In the early 1950s, she was involved in the creation and leading
performance of the first ballet in China: Dove of Peace. Two dances
with a strong national flavor, Dance of Lotus Flowers and Flying
Apsaras , swept the stages both home and abroad as they won the gold prize
at the World Youth Festival. By the 1990s, authoritative dance organizations
designated these two dances as 20th century classics of Chinese dance.
From 1950, Dai Ailian began to work at various leading posts, such as the
director of the Central Song and Dance Ensemble, the first dean of the Beijing
Academy of Dance, the director and adviser of the Central Ballet Troupe, and
vice-chairman of the Chinese Dancers' Association.
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