Join Eiko and her diverse group of collaborating artists, living and dead, for an investigation into how artists in duet collide, converse, and express what they care about.
THE DUET PROJECT: DISTANCE I MALLEABLE Friday and Saturday, February 11-12, 2022 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets: $30 General / $15 Industry / $10 Students Run time: 60 minutes Get your tickets! This will likely sell out. *use Industry22 to get half price tickets*
ADDITIONAL EVENTS Post-performance discussion following the Friday, February 11 performance
The Duet Project: Distance is Malleable is an interdisciplinary, intergenerational series of duets between Eiko Otake and a diverse group of collaborating artists, living and dead. Collaborators come from different places, times, disciplines, and concerns. These duets will investigate how two artists collide, converse, and express what they care about. The performances at the Dance Center will include choreographer and performer Ishmael Houston-Jones, trans performance maker, writer, and artist Iris McCloughan, and interdisciplinary artist, singer/songwriter, and producer DonChristian Jones as duet partners with the renowned Eiko Otake. Their encounters reaffirm that distance is indeed malleable.
Yumiko Yoshioka in a wide sumo stance, pointing a stick toward a painted brown circle on a cement wall. She dons a yellow rain coat and an impish look on her face. The sunlight creates a high contrast shadow.
Coming SOON, Yumiko will be hosting a very special Chicago-style Butoh class, broadcasting live and in person from her home in Tokyo.
March 18-20, 2022 On Zoom (listed below in Chicago, Honolulu, Tokyo time, dial in from Anywhere)
Register for one, two, or all three classes Friday in Chicago 8-9:30pm; Honolulu 3-4:30pm; Tokyo 10-11:30am (Saturday) Saturday in Chicago 8-9:30pm; Honolulu 3-4:30pm; Tokyo 10-11:30am (Sunday) Sunday in Chicago 8-10pm; Honolulu 3-5pm; Tokyo 10-12pm (Monday)
Three 90 minute classes with an opportunity for Q&A after the third class on March 20.
Yumiko has brought her very unique teaching to us many times in person, and this is her third online class for us during pandemic. We all look forward to the days when she will come again in person. For this set of classes we explore a new idea, won’t you join us?
What is onomatopoeia? (the sound that is the movement, for example, yura yura , puka puka, Aun, papipupepo….)
The word onomatopoeia comes from the combination of two Greek words, one meaning ‘name’ and the other meaning ‘I’ make. So, literally, onomatopoeia means the name (or sound) I make. For example, splat! or boing! Both these words are onomatopoeic and they mean nothing more than what they sound like.
These sounds become both playful and useful tools to deepen and cultivate our body and sensorial awareness.
Belonging to a third generation of Butoh artists, Yumiko has developed a personal style of bodywork called Body Resonance, which integrates Butoh practice with features of Noguchi Taiso gymnastics and various other Asian training methods to help prepare the body to receive and transmit dance and inspirations. Body Resonance starts from the idea that the world, including our body and soul, consists of vibrational waves that create constant resonances like echoes. When we tune our body to that frequency, we receive images, feelings and sensations accordingly. For this to happen, we need first to shake off unnecessary tension. In effect, we make a white canvas of our body to paint new color on it. I teach this as neutralization, encouraging a close-to-zero state, scouring off rust and polishing antenna to catch waves from profound layers of the body. The transformations and concentrations of dancing break up the eggshell of form. They melt down the armor of our ego, allowing resonant memories to emerge from our cells that are floating in the primal liquid of time.
(www.yumiko-yoshioka.com)
Yumiko Yoshioka pushes against the ground with the balls of her feet, facing us in a red tunic, with her head to the side, eyes and mouth open, and her braid pointing downward. Her arms dangle with gravity. Her shadow is a high contrast and behind her is a spray painted cement wall, with bright colors and basic shapes of blue, brown, and red.
May 6 – 8, 2022 Workshop in St.Cergue (near Geneva) in Switzerland contact : Joseph Viatte viattejoseph@gmail.com
Nov 19 and 20 at 8pm Dance Theater at Tanz Tangente in Berlin Steglitz (3G rule) HIROs Lied (Hiro´s Songs) About an immigrant Japanese mother with dementia
Dance: Asuka J. Riedl, Yumiko Yoshioka Choreography: Yoriko Maeno, Stage design: Mikako Kura
Yumiko Yoshioka. A face with a hand like a claw above it. Her torso in front of a brick wall, in a black tuxedo jacket, bright pink/red lips, her chin and cheekbones jutting up and forward, slightly cross-eyed, she has a look of defiance, a bit smug, with a tight smile.
Intensivos de danza butō por Marlène Jöbstl, en La Sala De Las Bestias ( R1 Ocata – Barcelona )
19, 20, 21 de marzo Activismo & Tabúes o El cuerpo político social en la danza
9, 10, 11 de abríl Erotismo & Gore o Explorar la insolencia en la danza 17 y 18 de abríl El Arte De Nacer seminario intensivo de butosofia por Jonathan Martineau
Leer más sobre las temáticas y pedagogías enunciadas:
On Zoom (listed below in Chicago, Honolulu, Tokyo time) Friday in Chicago 8-9:30pm; Honolulu 3-4:30pm; Tokyo 10-11:30am Saturday in Chicago 8-9:30pm; Honolulu 3-4:30pm; Tokyo 10-11:30am Sunday in Chicago 8-9:30pm; Honolulu 3-4:30pm; Tokyo 10-11:30am
**MAKE SURE TO FIND TIMES ACCORDING TO YOUR TIME ZONE. USE THE WORLD CLOCK**
Workshop Content: *Release exercises, inspired by Noguchi Taiso (Gymnastics), Taichi and Yoga *Breathing exercises *Dynamic training for the flow of energy *Butoh-related work to activate our universal memories (sensitization, combination of image and movement with antenna exercises such as figure of 8, water ball, animal, insect, snake, witch and fairy, the creatures inside us, hanging body, walking, dialogue with a partner etc) *Structured improvisation, free association
Yumiko Yoshioka, somewhat crouched, yet reaching toward us, the viewer, in a vibrant red dress, her hands splayed palms facing down and out in front of her. Her mouth is open and her eyes wide in surprised or terrible or wonderful thing. Her black hair whirs forward, stirred by the wind of her movements.
A Message from Yumiko: “I call my dance approach (or my body work) “Body Resonance.”
The world, including our body and soul, consists of vibrational waves that create constant resonances like echoes. When we tune our body to a certain frequency, we consequently get a resonance, and according to the frequency, we get different resonances. In order for this to happen, we need to first get rid of unnecessary tension.
Butoh (dance) for me activates divergent body energies that are usually not seen or permitted in our daily life. In other words, as our body is a receptacle of time, we can evoke its forgotten memories through dance.
Butoh has the intensity to trigger that process, because it creates heat through friction and cold through stillness. The transformations and concentrations of dancing break up the eggshell of form, melt down our armor of ego, as our stiff cells and sealed memories float in the primal liquid of time. Through a dialogue with our body, we learn not how to move, but to be moved. Consequently we realize that we are a part of the Universal, the wholeness.
My workshop, hopefully, can offer a help to enjoy that transformative /transcendental process of our entire presence.”
Contact sara@saratonin.com if you have questions about this workshop.
Yumiko Yoshioka Dancer, choreographer, teacher, art director.
Yumiko Yoshioka is a Japanese Butoh dancer and choreographer from Tokyo. Since 1988 she has been based in Germany. Yumiko is a former member of Ariadone, the first female Butoh company, which was founded by Ko Murobushi and Carlotta Ikeda in 1974. In 1978, she performed with Ko and Carolotta in Paris, LE DERNIER EDEN – PORTE DE L’AU-DELA, the very first Butoh performance to be presented in a public theatre outside Japan. In 1988 she met Minako Seki and delta RA’i in Berlin, with whom she founded tatoeba THÉÂTRE DANCE GROTESQUE. This experience, along with work with the Butoh dancer Kim-Itoh, encouraged Yumiko to start to unfold her own personal style of dancing and choreography.
In 1989 she also started to develop and teach her own form of bodywork. The approach became a pillar of her career as a reflection of her profound understanding of the importance of deepening consciousness of the body, not only in order to dance and express, but also to illuminate our daily life, opening ourselves to the deeper layers of our inner world and rediscovering a subtle beauty in each moment. The strength of this perception led her to create her own method of bodywork, called “Body Resonance”
Butoh Curious Chi 