François Duval (born 21 May 1743,

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

), known as Malter, was a French dancer. The son of Antoine Duval, a

dance master Dance Master UK is a dance competition held annually in the United Kingdom. Overview Dance Master UK was established in the late 1990s by the International Dance Teachers Association, as the male equivalent of their long running competition Mis ...

in Paris, and of Henriette Brigitte Malter, two of his elder brothers were also involved in the theatre world - Antoine Jean François Duval (1732–?) left Paris in 1755 and worked as a

in Rochefort/Mer, whilst Jean Charles Duval (1741–?) was first violin at the Comédie de

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of t ...

. François Duval was thus part of the

Malter family The Malter, Malterre or Maltaire family was a dynasty of French dancers and choreographers, from which came several members of the 18th century Académie royale de danse. It was a large family and it can often be difficult to identify its members w ...

, an 18th-century dynasty of dancers and dance-teachers, and married Marie-Anne Hamoir, also from a family of dancers. François became ballet master at the

Académie royale de Danse The Académie Royale de Danse, founded by Letters Patent on the initiative of King Louis XIV of France in March 1661, was the first dance institution established in the Western world. As one of King Louis’ first official edicts after the death ...

. From 1778 he worked with Louis Hamoir and Jean Nicolas Le Mercier, then François Bigottini, as head of the

Théâtre des Variétés-Amusantes The Théâtre des Variétés-Amusantes was a theatre company in Paris. History In 1778, Louis Lécluse (or Lécluze), a former actor at the Opéra-Comique turned dentist, opened a theatre at foire Saint-Laurent, which shortly afterwards he trans ...

, on rue de Bondy à Paris, at the

théâtre de la foire Théâtre de la foire is the collective name given to the theatre put on at the annual fairs at Saint-Germain and Saint-Laurent (and for a time, at Saint-Ovide) in Paris. Foire Saint-Germain The earliest references to the annual fair date to 11 ...

Saint-Laurent.

Sources

* Émile Campardon, ''Les spectacles de la Foire'', Paris 1877 * ''Dictionnaire de la danse'', Paris, Larousse, 1999

External links

''Les spectacles de la Foire'', by Émile Campardon, 1877
1743 births French male ballet dancers Year of death missing 18th-century French ballet dancers Dancers from Paris {{ballet-bio-stub