Sankai Juku: Tobari November 9, 2010

source: http://livelyarts.stanford.edu/

One of the most prominent Butoh companies of all time, Sankai Juku has earned a worldwide reputation for technical precision balanced by sublime elegance and profound depth of emotion. Founded in 1975 and still directed by master choreographer Ushio Amagatsu, Sankai Juku has performed in 43 countries and has garnered numerous honors in Japan—including the Geijutu Sensho Prize and the “Grand Prix” of the Asahi Performing Arts Awards—as well as England’s prestigious Olivier Award. As innovative as it is well-established, Sankai Juku continually expands the language of Ankoku Butoh (loosely translated as “dance of darkness”)—a post–World War II art form known for its often provocative subject matter and instantly recognizable by its stately movements and dancers covered in white make-up.

The company makes its Lively Arts debut in a performance of its most recent evening-length work, Tobari (As If in an Inexhaustible Flux). This enigmatic dance comprises seven tableaus depicting “the cosmos of life” in cycles of birth, death, and rebirth. As the company itself has stated of Tobari, which translates as “curtain”: “Happiness and sadness, light and darkness, life and death—they all waver softly like a hanging cloth.” During the work’s sold-out run of 2008 premiere performances in Paris, France’s Le Monde hailed the “splendid incongruity” of Tobari’s “dialogue with the invisible,” calling the program “a clear public success.”

Official Website: http://sankaijuku.com/