Marie Taglioni
In 1815 she was cast as the heroine in Flore et Zéphire, one of the first romantic ballets of the time. The ballet was choreographed by Charles Didelot, the chief choreographer of the Russian Imperial Ballet. Didelot had created a "flying machine", instituting the use of cables and wires to give the appearance of weightlessness. Because of his invention, Geneviève Gosselin could perform in pointe shoes. This was the first appearance of dancers en pointe. Gosselin was only able to balance for brief moments on the pointe shoes (although one critic says that she balanced for one minute). Gosselin paved the way for Amalia Brugnoli and Marie Taglioni, who often gets most of the credit for starting the pointe shoe trend. In fact, a critic of the era, cited that Marie Taglioni reminded him of Gosselin. Geneviève Gosselin died at the age of 27 in 1818, just three years after her appearance en pointe.