Dance Video Index

In this database, you will find 200 dance videos which were collected in the 2023 fiscal year under the auspices of the EPAD (Eternal Performing Arts Archives and Digital Theatre) .

Overview

• Title
• Performer(s)
• Year performed

• The Story of Sun and Moon (rehearsal)

  The Story of Sun and Moon' is a tale of light and shadow. It is also a story of a man's 'torn soul' as he searches through a labyrinth of light and shadow. The 'shadows', which at times turn into demi-gods and at times into kannon [goddess of Mercy], invite him to open several doors. Another self walks from the bottom of the water mirror. Rituals of death and rebirth in a labyrinth of expansion and contraction. A dream that regresses. The body of the dream is caught up in a spiral vortex...
  
  - Footage of a full-length rehearsal from a residency in Hinohara village in December 1992.
  - The performance took place at the Seed Hall in Tokyo from 22 January 1993 - 26 January 1993.

  

  Performer(s)

  Yukio Waguri + Kozensha

  Director/Choreographer

  Yukio Waguri

  Venue

  Hinohara village

  Year performed

  1993

• The Strange Dreaming Being (Welwitschia)

  This abstract work is inspired by Welwitschia mirabilis, a plant that lives for a thousand years in the deserts of Namibia, feeding only on sea mist and growing with only two leaves. Welwitschia, slumbering in a harsh environment, is born from a flower in a dream and plays inside a cosmic egg, then wanders in the deep jungle, carries fire and water, and longs for the lives that have passed by.

  

  Performer(s)

  Performance Troupe TAIHEN

  Director/Choreographer

  Manri Kim

  Venue

  AI Hall (Itami City Theater Hall)

  Year performed

  1992

• SUSABI [S’amuser]

  Premiered in Paris, 1989. 'S'amuser' (Susabi in Japanese), means 'play'. It is a part of the dance series 'Shozoku wa Mizu' [Costume is Water] which embodies the structure of self-love expressed in 'Awahi' from the same series, based on the Noh play 'Izutsu'. The beauty and dangers of love are expressed through a dance performed on top of a 1m² x 6mm glass sheet balanced on 5-6 cups filled 70% with water. During the performance in Paris, there was an incident where the dancer broke through the glass sheet, which later became a theme in Iwana Masaki's fourth feature film 'Charlotte-Susabi' (2017).
  
  -Masaki Iwana Solo Butoh Dance

  Performer(s)

  Studio 200

  Director/Choreographer

  Masaki Iwana

  Venue

  Studio 200

  Year performed

  1989

• Suzuranto Butoh Event: Mai Mizore

  Performance commemorating the publication of 'Suzuranto Shashin-shu: Mai Mai LOVE - Yami-suru Shiroki Maihime-tachi' [Suzuranto Photo Book: Mai Mai LOVE - White Dancers in the Dark] (Published 30 October 1981). Suzuranto was an all-female butoh group led by Yuki Yuko, and was a subset of the Hoppo Butoh-ha group led by Bishop Yamada. The group was named after lily of the valley [Suzuran in Japanese], a beautiful and poisonous plant. Toyotama Garan was the rehearsal space of Dairakudakan in Toyotama, Nerima Ward.

  Performer(s)

  Hoppo Butoh-ha

  Venue

  Dairakudakan Rehearsal Studio Toyotama

  Year performed

  1981

• A Table, or A Dream of Fetus

  A group dance piece first performed in 1980 by Ohno Kazuo and some of his students at the same Nancy International Theatre Festival where Ohno had made his international debut. It is thought to have been performed to a select few people after returning from the month-long tour at Ohno's studio in Yokohama, but the date of this performance is unknown.
  The cast as listed in the program for the performance at the Nancy International Theatre Festival is as follows:
  Fetus / Horse: Ohno Kazuo
  Grim Reaper: Ikebe Tokuji
  The Sun: Nakamura Moritsuna and Hideshima Minoru
  Madwoman who gives birth to the Sun, mother of the fetus: Uesugi Mitsuyo
  
  - Presumed to have been staged around July 1980.

  

  Performer(s)

  Kazuo Ohno Dance Studio

  Director/Choreographer

  Kazuo Ohno

  Venue

  Kazuo Ohno Dance Studio

  Year performed

  1980

• Takazashiki

  This piece is based on the image of a falconer in northern Japan, and this image in turn comes from when Hijikata Tatsumi brought a live turkey to 'Shiokubi', the opening performance of Hoppo Butoh-ha in Yamagata in 1975. It was kept in the rehearsal hall, where it died. Hijikata changed the entire choreography and Yuki Yuko, who played the role of hawk as well as falconer's wife, recalled that the performance was so driven it was as though Hijikata's spirit had possessed her.
  
  - Bishop Yamada Butoh Performance: Hearse of Four Seasons Part 1 - Spring
  

  

  Performer(s)

  Hoppo Butoh-ha

  Director/Choreographer

  Bishop Yamada,Tatsumi Hijikata

  Venue

  Sogetsu Hall

  Year performed

  1984

• Tale of Warazu

  Presented as part of the 1st OSAKA DANCE EXPERIENCE, a festival that ran for 6 years from 1995 to 2000 with the aim of re-exploring butoh. The butoh group Kobuzoku Arutai (Altaic), led by Kuritaro, had moved from Hokkaido to Kansai the previous year when Kuritaro moved to Tamba. 'Warazu' means 'straw' in the local Tamba-Sasayama dialect. While working in agriculture and construction, Kuritaro wanted to make a piece themed around peasants and the countryside, and created this work about seeking inner salvation from the inescapable reality of such a life.
  
  - 1st OSAKA DANCE EXPERIENCE: Performance by Kobuzoku Arutai (Altaic)

  Performer(s)

  TORII HALL

  Director/Choreographer

  Kuritaro

  Venue

  TORII HALL

  Year performed

  1995

• Tao

  Orita Katsuko is a creator of innovative contemporary dance. This new work 'Tao', bring the ceremony of her 1979 piece 'City of Memory' and transforms it in a more open space. It is an exploration of what can occur when the internal mechanisms and inherent drama of human beings intersect, which has been externalised and manifests in work of the dancers and choreographer. Tao shows ancient dreams to heretics whose memories are stuck in the past, opening their minds to the future. (Taken from the performance program)
  
  -Presented at the Orita Katsuko Dance Performance as part of the Dance Performance Tokyo '85 Festival of Tao.

  

  Performer(s)

  Midori Ishii and Katsuko Orita Dance Studio

  Director/Choreographer

  Katsuko Orita

  Venue

  Haiyuza Theater

  Year performed

  1985

• Tefutefu 7

  Kisanuki Kuniko began her experimental solo dance series Tefutefu at 23 years old in 1982, exploring the theme of where she is from. 'Tefutefu 7' is the seventh work in the series, a story of rebirth in which her body crawls out and howls, following the various lights and darks explored in the previous work 'Tefutefu 6'. If the series up to 'Tefutefu 6' were a series of wild imaginings, 'Tefutefu 7' is an internal reality that emerged out of the ashes of the previous works.
  
  - Kisanuki Kuniko Solo Dance Performance

  

  Performer(s)

  Kuniko Kisanuki

  Director/Choreographer

  Kuniko Kisanuki

  Venue

  Laforet Museum Akasaka

  Year performed

  1986

• Teleport TBS 6

  As an introduction to butoh, parts of the Butoh Festival '85 were shown on Teleport TBS 6, a local news programme on the TBS TV channel. It included commentary by Hijikata Tatsumi, Ichikawa Miyabi, Maro Akaji, Goi Teru and Tanaka Min, as well as shots of Dairakudakan and Maijuku's rehearsals. It provides a glimpse into the butoh of that period.
  
  - Covering Butoh Festival '85: Collection of Confessions Seven Seasons and Castles

  Performer(s)

  Nippon Cultural Centre

  Year performed

  1985

• 10 Motions

  A solo piece, composed of 10 movements in various combinations.
  
  -Participated in the 80 Summer/Autumn Dance Collection.
  

  Performer(s)

  Bonjin Atsugi

  Director/Choreographer

  Bonjin Atsugi

  Venue

  Sanbyakunin Theatre

  Year performed

  1980

• Tentai no Aki

  This work marks a turning point for Yamada Setsuko, where she began calling her work 'dance' instead of 'butoh'. Through an installation by Naito Hisayoshi, the manufactured space of Studio 200 in Seibu Ikebukuro became a stage leading to the other world - the ends of the earth, with bronze surfaces, rusty iron, scrap wood and white sand. Starting with the guitar piece 'International' by Shomura Kiyoshi, synthesised sounds by HIROKI intersect with Yamada's centripetal dance movements of rhythmic tension, creating a world formed of simplicity.
  
  - Yamada Setsuko Dance Performance

  

  Performer(s)

  Setsuko Yamada

  Director/Choreographer

  Setsuko Yamada

  Venue

  Studio 200

  Year performed

  1989

• Terminal Paranoid

  A site-specific work performed at an abandoned boarding school in Graz, Austria.
  The piece was created during a two-week intensive workshop with students of Yoshioka Yumiko, and co-choreographed by Eugeny Koylov, who was invited from St Petersburg. There was also a powerful installation by artist Joachim Manger, which worked together with the dance. It was the 2nd running of a project that has been held annually since 1995. Video footage for the 3rd run, set in a huge quarry used as an aeroplane repair site, has unfortunately been lost.
  
  - Butoh dance/theatre project

  Performer(s)

  tatoeba

  Director/Choreographer

  Yumiko Yoshioka, Eugeny Koylov

  Venue

  Closed school in Graz

  Year performed

  1996

• Theoria of the Mirror

  A new butoh work by Motofuji Akiko examining the issues of existence, nothingness, time and eternity, based on the book 'Kagami no Theoria' [Theoria of the Mirror] by Tada Chimako and incorporating a version of the mirror legend from Nagoya. It was performed as part of 'Eventalk Part VI: Visualising Hijikata Tatsumi' organised by the Aichi Arts Centre. Led by Motofuji Akiko with the Asbestos-kan troupe, a collaborative butoh atmosphere was created featuring Ohno Yoshito and a special guest appearance by Ohno Kazuo.

  

  Performer(s)

  Asbestos-kan

  Director/Choreographer

  Akiko Motofuji

  Venue

  Aichi Prefectural Art Theater : Mini theater

  Year performed

  1997

• Thoughts on Yesenin

  The Russian poet Sergei Yesenin, who had many colourful relationships, including marriages to Isadora Duncan and Tolstoy's granddaughter, was considered the 'last of the rural poets', writing about nature and comparing rural women to the Virgin Mary. He regarded himself a 'distanced poet', a wanderer with a fear of restraint. Taking from his final message the idea that "Life is a joke, but if there is no greatness in life, it cannot be that there is only greatness in death", the work contrasts Yesenin with the character of a clown.
  
  - Participated in the ACA National Arts Festival 1975

  

  Performer(s)

  Wakamatsu Miki & Tsuda Ikuko Free Dance Performance

  Director/Choreographer

  Miki Wakamatsu, Ikuko Tsuda

  Venue

  Toranomon Hall

  Year performed

  1975

• Through the tunnel. There was a house

  For the first time in a long time, I walked around the town where I was born and raised. The takoyaki restaurant by the canal, the chimney of a deserted sentō, a tunnel around 1m high... between the nostalgic scenes were karaoke bars and convenience stores that I had never seen before. Soaking my mind and body in this town where I had spent my childhood untroubled, something unexpected spilled out of the time and space accumulated there. I waited patiently for it to spill out again.
  
  - Participated in the 6th OSAKA DANCE EXPERIENCE: 1st half
  - Jareo Osamu and Terada Misako Dance Performance

  

  Performer(s)

  TORII HALL

  Director/Choreographer

  Jareo Osamu + Terada Misako

  Venue

  TORII HALL

  Year performed

  2000

• TOOBOE (Howl)

  TOOBOE (Howl) is a solo dance performance by Yuko Kaseki, co-created with Marc Ates. The production’s starting point was based on a story of the same name by Japanese author Hyakken Uchida (1889-1971). The story is told through illogical, odd happenings that emerge from the ordinary. Through his peculiar vision of consideration, consciously simple episode of expression success to find out the cleft in the ordinary construction. Through the door to the other side, to possibility of fantasy level, it gives one side anxiety on the other side appear the strange humour.
  Yuko Kaseki expose this situation by absurdity as same as humorous, with brevity way exist herself and her body in this world. Premiered in November 1998 at the loplop in Berlin.
  
  

  

  Performer(s)

  Yuko Kaseki

  Director/Choreographer

  Yuko Kaseki

  Venue

  DOCK11 (Berlin)

  Year performed

  2002

• Tohoku Kabuki Project 3: Hijikata Tatasumi’s Lecture

  The sound recording of the lecture by Hijikata. The 'Tohoku Kabuki Project', composed and directed by Hijikata Tatsumi, included performances by Ashikawa Yoko and the Tohoku Kabuki Research Group, as well as lectures and slides, and was held four times in March, June, September and December 1985 as the 'Studio 200 Butoh Lecture'. In the first session, lectures were given by Gōda Nario and Ōoka Makoto, by Baba Akiko and Uno Kuniichi in the second, Enomoto Ryōichi and Hijikata Tatsumi in the third, and Nagao Kazuo in the fourth. Hijikata was unable to attend the fourth session due to illness and died in January in the following year.
  
  - Tohoku Kabuki Project 3 was held on 28-30 September

  

  Performer(s)

  Studio 200

  Director/Choreographer

  Tatsumi Hijikata

  Venue

  Studio 200

  Year performed

  1985

• Tokyo DasSHOKU Girl

  Tokyo DasSHOKU Girl touches on the shadowy life of Japan which many never encounter. DasSHOKU (to bleach) strips off the colour of the superficial to reveal the reality behind the happy face of consumerism, bleaching away the commonly held views of Japanese women as kawai, or cute, polite and submissive. In Tokyo DasSHOKU Girl Yumi pays homage to the roots of Butoh as an anarchic dangerous and at the same time beautiful dance form.
  
  - Winner of the Melborne Fringe Festival Award and Green Room Award, Australia
  - Performed on 7th, 8th, 9th, 14th, 15th and 16th of October, 1999 at the Melbourne Fringe Festival

  

  Performer(s)

  Yumi Umiumare

  Director/Choreographer

  Yumi Umiumare

  Venue

  Czech House

  Year performed

  1999

• TORIKUBI – To dance wildly in the old day

  Inspired by the poem 'Torikubi' [The Bird's Head] by Yamanaka Chieko, this work contains ancient ritualistic elements. Yamada performs wearing a large headdress and adopting a limp, clearly searching for a new perspective on the body. Usually known for performing solo, in this piece she is joined by Sato Miwako and Sugiyama Keiko. Performed in a space composed of earth, water and paper, this work appears to cross the boundaries between dance, gesticulation and actions.
  
  - Yamada Setsuko Butoh Performance

  

  Performer(s)

  Setsuko Yamada

  Director/Choreographer

  Setsuko Yamada

  Venue

  Institut français de Tokyo

  Year performed

  1986

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