Women's History Month: Celebrating Eva Encinias

March is Women’s History Month and we want to highlight a different woman of NIF each week, beginning with Eva Encinias, who has been the heartbeat of the National Institute of Flamenco for the past 40 years.

Last year, Eva was honored by the National Endowment for the Arts as a National Heritage Fellow. The NEA National Heritage Fellowship is the nation's highest honor in folk and traditional arts.

An archival photo of Eva Encinias dancing.

Eva has devoted her life to flamenco, touching the lives of multiple generations of dancers. In 1973 she established her own dance company, Ritmo Flamenco, which toured regionally in the Southwest for 15 years. By 1976, she was teaching flamenco at the University of New Mexico, spearheading the development of both undergraduate and graduate degrees with concentrations in flamenco, the only accredited dance program in the world to boast such specializations.

Then, in 1982 she founded the National Institute of Flamenco where she continues to teach and inspire students as young as 3 — many who are the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of those she taught in the ‘70s and ’80s.

Eva was born into a family of flamencos here in Albuquerque, NM. Her grandmother, Juanita Lopez, was a resadora, a woman who knew the repertoire of traditional alabados (sacred Spanish-language hymns). Her mother, Clarita García de Aranda, ran a one-room studio in Albuquerque, where she taught dance classes through the 1950s. Eva and her siblings were immersed in the art form from birth, just as her children would be.

Throughout her career, Eva’s work has been recognized with many awards, including an induction into El Orden de Isabel la Católica, an honor bestowed upon her by the King of Spain, Felipe VI.