Pearl Primus.

Pearl Primus, 74, the dancer, choreographer, and teacher who created for Americans an awareness of the riches of African and Caribbean culture, died after a short illness in New Rochelle, New York, on October 29, 1994.

Born in Trinidad and raised in the United States, Primus was a pre-med graduate of Hunter College who, unable to find a laboratory job, applied to the National Youth Administration and was directed into dance. She studied and later taught at the New Dance Group, and, after seeing a performance of her work in 1943, the critic John Martin encouraged her in her career.

She performed in nightclubs, a production of Show Boat, and with her own company on Broadway. A Rosenwald Foundation scholarship enabled her to study dance in Africa, where she lived, studied, and worked with local performers. With her husband, Percival Borde, she founded a school in New York. She was made director of a new performing arts center in Monrovia, Liberia, toured Africa, and still found time to complete a doctorate in anthropology at New York University in 1978. She received many honors, including the National Medal of Arts in 1991 and, most recently, the NEA Master Teacher Mentor Award for 1995.

Kaleria Fedicheva, 58, Russian ballerina and teacher, died of cancer on September 13, 1994, in Maribor, Slovenia.

She was graduated from the Kirov ballet school in 1955 and excelled in the nineteenth-century classics. After her marriage to Martin Fredmann, now artistic director of Colorado Ballet, she emigrated to the United States following protracted difficulties with authorities in the former Soviet Union. Divorced from Fredmann, she staged, choreographed, and taught throughout the United States and also abroad.

Jon Mensinger, 37, a principal dancer with Mark Morris Dance Group, died of AIDS on September 13, 1994, in New York City.

Trained at Ohio State University and New York University, he performed with the Morris company from 1982 to 1991. He also danced with American Dance Machine and Douglas Dunn and Dancers.

Jeff Wadlington, 29, a former member of Paul Taylor Dance Company, died of AIDS at his home in Galisteo, New Mexico, on September 24, 1994.

He trained at North Carolina School of the Arts and danced with the companies of May O'Donnell and Joyce Trisler in the 1980s. He was the first scholarship student at the Taylor school and the first to graduate into the company. Roles that Taylor created for him included the "Boogie-Woogie Bugle Boy" solo in Company B and Himself, as He Reflects in Speaking in Tongues.

James Farnsworth, 42, tap dancer, choreographer, and teacher, died of AIDS in San Diego on July 25, 1994.

He had taught and performed tap extensively, both in the United States and abroad, and had been a high school teacher of theater, English, and Spanish as well as a theater administrator.

Nelle Fisher, 79, a dancer and choreographer, died of complications from Parkinson's disease on October 19, 1994.

A native of Berkeley, California, she grew up in Seattle where she received her initial training. She performed with Martha Graham, in Broadway musicals, and on the 1950s television program Your Show of Shows. Later she directed and taught around the United States and abroad.

David Steiger Wolfe, 40, a dancer and choreographer, died of AIDS-related illness in Boston on April 3, 1994.

A native of New York City, Wolfe earned bachelor's and master's degrees from Brandeis University and Smith College, respectively. He danced and choreographed for a number of modern dance companies and led his own ensemble, David Wolfe Dances, from 1983 to 1986.

Joseph Marshall, 28, a former dancer with Feld Ballets/NY, Joffrey Ballet, and Oregon Ballet Theatre, died of AIDS in Portland, Oregon, on April 14, 1994.

Born Joseph Marshall Brown in Vancouver, Washington, he studied at the Joffrey school and danced with Joffrey II for several years before joining the Feld company.

Heywood "Woody" McGriff, 36, a dancer, choreographer, and teacher, died of AIDS on May 8, 1994, in Austin, Texas.

He performed in New York City with Nina Wiener, Jennifer Muller, and the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane company. Later he joined the faculty of the University of Texas, where he was an associate professor of dance at the time of his death.

Sondra Lomax

Klarna Pinska, 93, a modern dancer and longtime San Francisco Bay Area teacher, died of a heart attack in San Francisco on May 29, 1994.

Born Charma Pachapinsky in Ukraine, Pinska and her family settled in San Francisco in 1918. She became a pupil of Ruth St. Denis and later a member of the Denishawn company. The major part of her career was spent as a teacher of dance and movement.

Viktor Rona, 57, former principal dancer and then director of the ballet at the Budapest Opera House, died of AIDS in Budapest on January 15, 1994.

Rona studied with Pushkin in St. Petersburg and had an international performing career apart from his work in Hungary. He taught and coached at Paris Opera Ballet, Royal Swedish Ballet, and Tokyo Ballet, among others.

Evelyn Teri

Ida Parkinson Bruce, 93, a ballet dancer who performed in America in the 1920s, died in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, on February 20, 1994.

Trained in ballet in her native England, she came to the United States with Beatrice Lillie and Charlot's Theatrical Revue. She performed with that company and others across the country.

Robert Ronan Fisher, 58, a dancer, teacher, and ballet company cofounder, died of AIDS in Placerville, California, on February 27, 1994.

Born in Placerville, he was the premier danseur of Sacramento Civic Ballet and performed under the name Robert Ronan with several companies, including Oakland Light Opera Company, East Bay Civic Ballet, and others. In the mid-1950s he joined the Ballet de Cuba as a soloist, returning to the United States at the outbreak of the Cuban revolution.

In 1958 Fisher opened the Academy of Ballet in Placerville with his wife at the time, Carol Fisher. He cofounded Capitol City Ballet Company, a nonprofit organization to train local dancers.

Roy Lozano, 40, a ballet folklorico dancer and choreographer, died of AIDS-related pneumonia in Austin, Texas, on March 4, 1994.

A second-generation Mexican-American born in Corpus Christi, Texas, Lozano began his dance studies while in high school and joined the Ballet Folklorico de Mexico in 1977. After several seasons with the company, he settled in Austin and founded the Roy Lozano Ballet Folklorico de Tejas in 1982. He was still the company's artistic director at the time of his death.

Sondra Lomax

Suzy Strain, 35, a leading dancer with Ballet Chicago, died at her home in Chicago on March 6, 1994.

She had danced with the company since its founding and had performed leading roles in Balanchine's Steadfast Tin Soldier and Apollo as well as in works by the company's artistic director, Daniel Duell, and its resident choreographer, Gordon Peirce Schmidt.

She had previously danced with National Ballet Company, Eglevsky Ballet, Kansas City Ballet, Eliot Feld, and also with Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux and Patricia McBride.

Ann Barzel

Virginia Dale, 77, a dancer who was Fred Astaire's partner in the 1942 film Holiday Inn, died of emphysema complications in California on October 3, 1994.

Her original name was Virginia Paxton, and she appeared as one of the dancing Paxton Sisters on the New York stage before embarking on a Hollywood film career.

ALSO NOTED ... Linda (Sieglinde) Zamponi, dancer and critic, December 5, 1993; Gladysruth Gudgel Hanme, 86, ballet dancer and teacher, March 2, 1994; Lorenzo Bianco Schlick (Larry Bianco), 61, Broadway dancer, March 16, 1994; Malcolm Anthony (Toney) Pennewell, Oakland, California, dancer, teacher, and choreographer, March 23, 1994; Sylvester Dolinar, 43, Portland, Oregon, dancer, teacher, and choreographer, April 8, 1994; Christopher Hawks, Philadelphia dancer and performance artist, April 15, 1994; Peter Reed, 40, dancer and filmmaker, May 1, 1994; June Runyon, 88, Oklahoma dance teacher, May 15, 1994.