Nakotah LaRance, Acclaimed Native American Hoop Dancer, Dies at 30

Nakotah LaRance, a nationally acclaimed Hopi-Tewa hoop dancer who performed with Cirque du Soleil, died on July 12 near the Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo in New Mexico. He was 30.

His father, Steve LaRance, said he died after falling while climbing a bridge in Rio Arriba County, N.M.

Mr. LaRance’s career began when he was 4 and his aunt Lynnae Lawrence took him to a powwow, where he met the hoop dancer Derrick Suwaima Davis. Mr. Davis made Mr. LaRance his first set of hoops and taught him the basics of the style known as fancy dance.

Hoop dances, a tradition in many Native American cultures, are passed down from one generation to the next, as Mr. Davis did with Mr. LaRance. The dances, which can involve more than 50 hoops, paint pictures of individual and tribal stories. The circular shape of the hoops symbolizes the circle of life; the hoops are decorated with tape and paint to represent the changing colors of each season.