Aki Bo Nishijima was born in Japan and has been making solo and group dance works since 1994. Currently she is interested in making a new piece with personal movements and stories in more theatrical frame.This is her first butoh performance.
Benjamin Marcantoni was an opera singer in New York Butoh Festival 2003 with an extraordinary vocal and emotional range. Trained in music from an early age, he has a wide variety of stage experience, having performed in venues all over the USA and the Caribbean. He has been active as a singer/songwriter, arranger and stage performer since his arrival in New York City in late 1999. He has also garnered credits as teacher, poet, writer, and graphic designer. Benjamin is the co-founder of the post-alternative rock ensemble Tara’s Road, and was active in the city’s music scene.
Timothy R. Pickerill is a writer, artist, musician, and designer working in installation and performance art, as well as painting, photography, and video. Completing studies at San Francisco State University in 1998, after being expelled from Dada studies, he has since self produced many solo and group performance art pieces. He has worked in traditional and nontraditional theater including several years as the Technical Director of both Theater Artaud and Dance Mission Theater in San Francisco and is the technical director of BRIC Studios in Brooklyn. Timothy Pickerill is a writer, designer, and multi media performance artist. He completed studies … Continued
Catherine Wilenchek-Iwakawa has resided in NYC for the past 10 years, drawing inspiration from the urban landscape. After working as a fashion stylist in the South, she relocated to New York to study both Fashion design and fine art at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Honing her skills under the watchful eye of such names as Calvin Klein and Ralph Lauren she was eventually driven to design her own line Atelier Cloth in the form of wearable art. In 1999 she began a life long collaboration with contemporary artist Naoki Iwakawa experimenting with cloth, paint and the elements creating often … Continued
Moeno Wakamatsu is a dance/theater artist coming from a background of being a pianist and an architect. She has also been teaching the Feldenkrais Method for 10 years. Her work exists outside of the art of ideas and concepts and aims to direct communication in intensified time and space. She has performed solo works in the US, Canada, and Europe. She has worked with Tetsuro Fukuhara, Mana Hashimoto, Kiyoko Kashiwagi, Joan Laage, Pierre Mansire, Kristin Narcowich, Bo Akiko Nishijima, Atsushi Takenouchi, Nancy Zendora and others.
Multi Media Performance Artist, Composer. In Japanese “zémi” is a name for the shrill loud insect, known in English as a cicada. A special bread of the cicada, known as the periodical cicada, has adapted a unique 17-year lifecycle. These insects present themselves on the surface of the earth for only a month; to mate, sing and die. There is a multitude of ancient stories from every continent about the cicada and their roll in the resurrection of passing souls. In moving I explore their contrast between patience and exhilaration; in hearing I listen for their composition like a frame … Continued
Steven Carlino is a butoh influenced multi- disciplinary performance artist. Performed and collaborated with punk, noise avante-jazz bands in the Midwest, designing sound for dance/theater.
Megan Nicely is a dancer/choreographer and educator. After many years directing her company in the bay area she is currently pursuing her Ph.D in Performance Studies at NYU.
MORGAN VON PRELLE PECELLI works as curator, producer, anthropologist and artist in NYC. www.lostnotebok.org
Bill Mullen is a visual artist working in NY, has studied/performed with Takuya Muramatsu (Dairakudakan), has been an active participant in the Butoh-Kan training, Program at CAVE.
Stephanie Lanckton is a dancer/choreographer, trained in Ballet/Modern/Capoeira/Hip-hop. Graduated from Point Park College, attended Intelochen Arts Academy, is a certified Pilates instructor. Performed with Akira Kasai, in “Butoh America”(2007).
Catalina Santamaría (Vice President) is a film artist and producer at CUNY TV, where she creates overall network strategy, plans content, and collaborates with award-winning directors such as Alan Berliner in New York and Caridad Sorondo in Puerto Rico since 2015. Her work as a director, producer, photographer, and editor has garnered awards world-wide. Select films and awards include: UMBRELLA HOUSE, LUMINESCENCE, EXCEPT MY SOUL…, “El Espejo”, DERAIL, and SQUATTERS/OKUPAS.
A. Dola Baroni is an LA based artist, photographer, choreographer, curator and director who represents the West Coast and bleeds Laker Purple.
NYBF Photographer
JONOTHON LYONS is a company member of Imago Theater Mask Ensemble (3yrs), he has performed with LEIMAY and Mari Osanai; participating in several sessions of the NY Butoh-Kan.
Teerawat Mulvilai (Aka Kage) (Thailand) – Theater director/dancer, Artistic Director\Co-Founder of B-Floor Theatre. Lincoln Center Director’s Lab 2009 trained in Butoh, Top Ma Pab (Northern Thai Martial Art), Viewpoints, and modern dance.
Mana Hashimoto (born: Tokyo) trained in ballet, piano composition and modern dance: New England Conservatory, Berklee Academy of Music and Martha Graham School. She began losing sight at 17, continuing performances/organizing dance for the visually impaired.
Jonás Hidalgo is a photographer and drummer from Venezuela. He mentions his father Enrique, a musician, composer and sculptor now living in Miami, as his main creative influence during his upbringing years. Jonás studied graphic design in Caracas where he was first introduced to photography as an optional course. Later he attended the “Arte 3” workshop, sponsored by the “Comisión Nacional de la Cultura”. He then went to “Casa de las Américas” in La Havana, Cuba studying with Luis González Palma. During the fall of 1999 he relocated to New York where he currently lives and works.
Amos Pinhasi has presented hiswork in New York since 1985 and has been produced by DTW’s FreshTracks, The 40Up Project, Joyce Soho, Dance now, Dumbo Dance Festival, and Danspace Project. He has toured his solo work in Switzerland, Austria, Germany and his native Israel.He teaches dance improvisation and yoga internationally.
Irem Calikusu’s life as a dancer started in Istanbul, at the Theater Research Lab with Mustafa Kaplan. Being deeply moved by a butoh performance she saw in Istanbul, she went on to complete a Master’s thesis on but and post war politics in Japan at the Anthropology Department of Mass, Amherst. She has studied with Akira Kasai, Ko Murobushi, and Takuya Muramatsu as well as trained for 2 years at the Cunningham School for Dance. Her biggest inspiration was the 5 months she spent training with Min Tanaka at the Body Weather Farm. Irem has been showing her own work … Continued
Parker Pracjek works in the areas of creative writing, Adult Basic Education, literacy through the arts, and dance theatre performance. Her work has been seen in community arts festivals,The Mulberry Street Theatre, The Puffin Room,La Mama, andWOWCafé Theatre. Praciek holds a Master’s degree in Performance Studies from NYU and works as Managing Director of the New York Butoh Festival.
Celeste Hastings is a NYC based choreographer, performer, costume and soundscape designer, and experimental videographer. her work fuses dance, theater and Japanese butoh. A lead dancer for 12 years with post modern butoh company Poppo and Gogo Boys, she has collaborated with many artists/companies such as Richard Move, Noemie Lafrance, Anemone Dance Theater, Black Moon Theater, Mpenp Wakamatsu, NAdine Helstroffer, Marilo, Sanjo, Accion Colectiva Venezuela, Tetsuro Fukuhara and Eri Majima (Japan), Director Antonio Laj (Poland and NY), co-editor with filmaker Simon Grome and is working with Akira Kasai;s Butoh America NYC Production.
Erin Ellen Kelly has trained with butoh masters Ko Murobushi, Takuya Muramatsu, Tetsuro Fukuhara, and Diego Piñon and employs techniques from butoh, qigong, gymnastics, farming, cabaret dancing, and performance action-theater to create new works, ways of moving, and performance installation pieces that comment on the human condition and its relationship to the environment and society. Erin has greeted and collaborated on site specific dance performances in gardens, galleries, warehouse spaces, boats and theaters across the U.S.and Europe and created commissioned work for LaMama in New York and Schloss Bröllin in Germany. Also Founding member of RansomCorp. Active from 1999-20002. Erin … Continued
Tanya Calamoneri works in the areas of contemporary dance, Japanese Butoh, and physical theater. She started choreographing her own work in 1997, via her collective with Allen Willner and Krista DeNio, violent dwarf. Based in San Francisco from 1996-2003, she was ED of Dancers’ Group, and Co-Director of both 848 Community Space and Temescal Arts Center, and was a founding faculty member of the Experimental Performance Institute at New College of CA. She attended Moving On Center School for Participatory Arts and Research from 1996-7 (directed by Martha Eddy and Carol Swann), danced for and was company manager to Kim … Continued
Mei Yin Ng has had the privilege of working and collaborating with Remote Control Productions/Michael Laub in Europe, Nyo-Ba & Dancers in Malaysia, & AMEYE in New York City. She founded MEl-BE Whatever Company (www.MeiBeWhatever.com) in 2002 as a collective for the interaction of artists from diverse fields. Initially focusing on modern movement as inner being, Ms. Ng’sw o r kcontinues to evolve with the possibilities of contemporary technologies
Vangeline is the Artistic Director of the Vangeline Theater, a postmodern Butoh dance company firmly rooted in the tradition ofJapanese But while carrying it into the 21st century. She joined the Butoh Ritual Mexicano with Master Diego Pinon in 2002, and is assistant Director to Butoh Master Tetsuro Fukuhara for the project TOKYO SPACE DANCE. www.vangeline.com
Tatsuro Ishii is a dance critic and Professor at Keio University in Tokyo. He writes Cance reviews for the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun, DanceMagazine, and others. He si the author of such books as The Spirit Journey of the Body Expression, Sexuality of Transvestism, Essays on Female Transvestism, The Climactic Point of Body, etc. He has served is the judge of Cairo IE Theatre Festival Egypt (2002), Director of Butoh Festival in Seoul, Korea (2005), and Judge of Toyota Choreography Award (2006).
DENISE FUJIWARA is a choreographer, dancer, actor, dance impresario and teacher with 27 years of professional experience. Fujiwara’s dance has been featured in dance festivals in Seattle, Washington DC, Vancouver, Calgary, Copenhagen, Ecuador and India. Based in Canada, Fujiwara continues to develop original solo and ensemble dance performance
Takuya Ishide was born in Tokyo in 1958. Former student of Ishi Mitsutaka and Tatsumi Hiikata, he performed in Hijikata’s last work, Tohoku Kabuki Keikaku 2 and 4 in 1985 with Min Tanaka. He also danced with Saburo Teshigawara’s Company, KARAS, touring in France. His solo work has toured Korea, Japan, U.S., and Europe.
Taketeru Kudo trained under two of butoh’s most famous dancers, Akiko Moto- fuji (the widow of butoh’s co-creator Tatsumi Hijikata) and the famed butoh group Sankai Juku (with whom he danced for 5 years and toured internationally). Kudo left Sankai Juku to form his own company in 1997 and began to work with free-jazz musicians from Japan’s urban enclave.
Yoshito Ohno is the son of butoh legend Kazuo Ohno and is a renowned dancer and teacher. His career has literally spanned the entire history of butoh. Since 1986, he has directed all of Kazuo Ohno’s performances, as well as creating solo work and teaching.
Atsushi Takenouchi joined Hoppo-Butoh-ha in Hokkaido, Japan in 1980. He has been developing his own “JinenButoh” since 1986, touring and teaching extensively throughout Japan, Eastern and Western Europe, Asia and Australia. His work is concerned with universal expressions of nature, earth, and ancient life.
Mari Osanai is trained in classical ballet, Noguchi Gymnastics, yoga, tai chi, and hip hop. Her unique movements are realized through interweaving these diverse techniques with the philosophy and practice of Noguchi Gymnastics.
Yuko Kaseki is a freelance dancer, choreographer and teacher in Berlin. Kaseki has developed her own rich choreographic vocabulary that is rhythmic and elegant. Yuko Kaseki has lived and worked as a freelance dancer, choreographer and teacher in Berlin since 1995. From 1989 to 2001, she was the primary dancer in Anzu Furukawa’s seminal butoh group Dance Butter Tokio. With her company cokaseki (formed with Marc Ates), Kaseki has developed her own rich choreographic vocabulary that blends butoh with modern dance techniques. heh as performed her solo and ensemble work throughout Europe, Japan and the U.S., and since 2001 has … Continued
Evan Mazunik – pianist, composer, and Soundpainter – is assistant conductor of the New York Soundpainting Orchestra. As a composer, he scored the documentary “The Checker King,” which aired on HBO2. As a performer, he has played with Carla Bley, Steve Swallow, Dick Oatts and Robert Paredes. Mazunik is also keyboardist for the Walter Thompson Orchestra www.evanmazunik.com
AKIRA KASAI has been called the “Niinsky of butoh” because of the stunning energy and concentration of his wild improvisational dances. In the 1960s, he studied with butoh co-founder Kazuo Ohno, and in 1971 started his own butoh company, Tenshi-kan. He moved to Germany in 1979 and trained there for six years in eurhythmy. A pivotal figure in the butoh world, since his return to Japan, he has cultivated his own highly idiosyncratic style of dance, pushing the envelope of butoh by mixing in elements as diverse as German eurhythmy, kabuki and hip-hop. Akira Kasai, born in 1943, originally studied … Continued
Berlin-based group cokaseki is led by Yuko Kaseki (choreographer/dancer) and Marc Ates (choreographer/director)w, ho have performed their work throughout Europe,J apan and the U.S. Their last production Ame to Ame was nominated for Visual design at the 2005 Isadora Duncan Dance Awards in San Francisco- the piece received the Award for ‘Best Ensemble Work’. www.cokaseki.com
Masaki lwana began his dance career in 1975 outside the “butoh genealogy.” Until 1982 he presented 150 experimental performances in which he stood straight, completely naked and perfectly still. Since then, lwana has presented his performances and workshops in 38 countries and has created works which are built on his sharpened aesthetic. Iwana runs an institute for the research of butoh, La Maison du Butoh Blanc, in Normandy, France since 1995. www.iwanabutoh.com
Kan Katsura, a native of Kyoto born in 1948, is a butoh dancer from Japan’s third generation of ankoku butoh (dance of darkness). He performed with the seminal butoh troupe, Byakkoshakn own for its austerity and integrity, rather than the theatrical glamour other troupes became known for. He is a celebrated solo and collaborative performer as well as choreographer and he established his own group KATSURA Kan & Saltimbanques in 1986. Kan has worked with what he calls “minority dancers” all over the world, in remote locations from Africa to South East Asia, for the past 26 years.
Jack Wright, a musical explorer for the past twenty years, plays alto, tenor, and sopranos axes, contralto clarinet, and piano, in every possible direction, but rarely what is recognizable.
Azumaru is a rising star of the butoh dance world. In 1999 he became a member of the acclaimed butoh group Dairakudakan and began training with its legendary director Akaji Maro. He choreographed his first performance S,uccession of the Beast, in 2003. In 2005 he left Dairakudakan to pursue a solo career.
Born in 1941, Daisuke Yoshimoto has collaborated with the greatest artists of butoh, such as Kazuo Ohno, Hisayo lwaki and Yukihiko Sakai. Primarily a solo artist, over the past twenty years he has carved out his own unique and theatrical style. Based in Tokyo, he tours and teaches workshops internationally. Eros and Thanatos premiered in 2004 at the Grotowski Center in Poland and subsequently toured to Spain. Daisuke Yoshimoto’s dance experience also includes collaborations with Kazuo Ohno, Hisayo Iwaki, and Shoji Kojima. Primarily a solo artist, over the past 20 years he has carved out his own unique theatrical style, … Continued
Yumiko Yoshioka was a founding member of the first all-female butoh company Ariadone and has been instrumental in bringing butoh to Europe first with Ariadone in Paris in 1978 and then in Berlin with tatoeba THEATRE DANSE GROTESQUE (1988-1994). She has toured and taught extensively in Japan, Europe, Russia Israel and both North and South America and presently is based at schloss broellin in eastern Germany where she runs the company TEN PEN Chii art labor with visual artist Joachim Manger and musician Zam Johnson. Since 1995 she also has been an artistic director of “eX .. it! Dance Exchange … Continued
Yuko Kawamoto wants to express light in darkness, movement in tranquility and a strong sense of existence.She trained in ballet before her work with Shinonome Butoh.
Initially trained in modern dance.She then studied intensively with Yukio Waguri, and under his guidance formed the Tokyo-based group Shinonome with Yuko Kawamoto and Asuka Shimada in the mid 1990s.The word shinonome comes from the Japanese term for the twilight sky, when the darkness fades away in daylight. Shinonome’s fresh approach differs from what has been translated in the West as butoh’s “dance of darkness” – instead they show a more twilight world that balances the dark and the light. Chisato Katata’s website: http://www.shinonomebutoh.com
Zack Fuller is a DIY dancer/choreographer and self-taught musician. From 1985-1986 he was the lead singer for the Washington DC post-punk psychedelic metal band Scythian, sharing stages with groups such as Bad Brains, Black Market Baby, and Pussy Galore. He has performed in many dances under the direction of Min Tanaka, including Poe Project in 1997. He co-headlined the 2019 Boston Butoh Festival with Yuko Kaseki, and his dances have been presented at Leimay/CAVE, Movement Research at Judson Church, Plan B in Tokyo, Mobius in Boston, The Dance Hakushu Festival, The New England Conservatory of Music, and elsewhere.
Ko Murobushi trained and performed with butoh’s creator Tatsumi Hijikata and was a founding member of Dairakudakan, the longest-running butoh company. His influential group Ariadone introduced Europe to butoh in 1978. Based in Japan, he leads the Edge Company and tours internationally throughout Europe and South America. Ko Murobushi trained and performed with butoh’s creator Tatsumi Hijikata and was a founding member of Dairakudakan, the longest-running butoh company. In 1974, he founded the female butoh company Ariadone with Carlotta Ikeda; two years later he founded Sebi, a corresponding all-male butoh group. In 1978, Murobushi introduced butoh to Europe with a … Continued
Shinichi Iova Koga is an actor and dancer, has performed internationally since 1988. Artistic Director of the butoh group inkBoat in San Francisco, his theatrical, multi-media pieces are heavily influenced by his training in film, butoh, Action Theater and Suzuki method. Shinichi MOMO Koga is a silent actor and Butoh dancer(Hijikatalineage) whose productions, both solo and ensemble, have been causing havoc since 1988. As teacher, performer and as the Artistic Director of inkBoat, Koga restructures dance, theater and cinema forms, extracting the vital essence of each to create a sharper reality. Koga’s works have been presented throughout Europe, Japan and … Continued
Yukio Waguri was born in Tokyo in 1952. In 1972, he became the pupil of’ Tatsumi Hijikata. He established his own group Yukio Waguri +Kohzensha, releasing solo and group dance works in Tokyo. Waguri inherited and developed Hiikata’s method of choreographic notation, which evokes body image through language. He isknown for his solid and lithe body, beautiful shape, and rich expressive power. He collaborates closely with musical and theatrical artists and is highly praised as a dance designer and a stage director. He released the CD-ROM, Butoh- Kaden in 1998, which was re- released in 2006. Yukio Waguri, the artistic … Continued
Dawn Akemi Saito is an actress, performance artist, writer and butoh dancer. She has collaborated with major innovative performance groups in the U.S., Europe, Asia and South America. Her multi-disciplinary works include: Blood Cherries, directed by Jonathan Rosenberg and Sabrina Peck at Dance Theater Workshop; A Face of Our Own, in collaboration with composer Myra Melford presented at the Orpheum Theatre in Graz, Austria; Leaves, Water, Sun presented at the Berkshire Theatre Festival; HALO presented at the Asian American Theatre Workshop at MarkTaper and Highways Performance Space in Santa Monica; HA, a solo dance-theatre piece directed by Maria Mileaf and … Continued
SU-EN (Susanna Akerlund) is a dancer and choreographer from Sweden, and artistic director of the SU-EN Butoh Company. Her work is based on the Hijikata/Ashikawa method that was developed in the Tomoe Shizune & Hakutobo group. For five years, SU-EN was a member of the student group GNOME for which Yoko Ashikawa choreographed. SU-EN also holds a nattori license in Jiuta-mai Japanese dance. Since 1994 SU-EN has developed her work in a more contemporary direction: incorporating a variety of influences – from Nordic culture and landscape to conceptual and performance art. SU-EN teaches and performs extensively in Sweden and internationally. … Continued
Joan Laage, Artistic Director of Dappin’ Butoh since 1991, moved to Seattle after studying under butoh masters Kazuo Ohno and Yoko Ashikawa in Japan, and performing in Ashikawa’s group, Gnome. She has taught butoh workshops in the Seattle area for over 10 years and has been a guest artist at Ohio State University, the University of Georgia, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, and UNITEC in New Zealand.
Photography exhibitions at NYBF 2003
DREW FORD was born on a farm in Western New York, south of Buffalo. He has since left the farm to pursue his creative endeavors. In the past, Ford has been known to create works which involve ceramics, video, installation and illustration. In the current greenman world work, Ford investigates issues of balance between individuality and social connectivity. He was a published comic book artist and writer before turning his attention to fine art. Ford began showing his work in galleries around 2002. He has created works using everything from new media and ceramics to drawings and performance.
Before receiving an M.A. in Religion, she received a BFA in Dance from the University of the Arts, taught dance at UPenn, and danced with Dappin Butoh, Degenerate Art Ensemble, PAN and low crawlers high flying in Seattle. She danced with Ausdruckstanz in Philly, sang with the Philadelphia Chamber Chorus, and risked her life via bicycle on the streets of Philadelphia.
Yoyoyogasmana was born in Bandung, Indonesia. In 1996, he graduated from IKIP Bandung/Fine Art Department. His performance work has been presented in numerous galleries and festivals in countries, such as: Taiwan, Poland, Finland and Japan. He is also an art organizer working with Indonesian organizations such as the TMIB [Student Theater Group of IKIP BANDUNG] B+PAC [Bandung Performance Art Community], IAPAO [ International Association of Performance Art Organizers] and LINKART [ Forum Apresiasi Budaya ]. Yoyoyogasmana has been selected to be an artist-in-residence at CAVE for three months, his residency will finished in December 2005. People seem always be interested … Continued