Naha – Bise – Sapporo
The journey to meet Asian bodies – Traditional and Contemporary
I saw Mr. Daniel Yeung in Hong Kong after 15 year since last time. It was in 2002, we invited Daniel as residency artist to AIR program in Kyoto and Solo, Indonesia. Long time gap is not there, we busted into talking that we have to corporate each other to survive in a small performing arts market in Asia, also develop it.
With the further discussion with an old friend Daniel, we found the AIR program theme – The Journey to meet Asian bodies. As one of the Asian countries, Hong Kong and Japan has same issue on performing arts which is affected by Western society. Now is the timing to open our eyes to Asian traditional dance and performing arts, Culture, Folklore…then we possibly step into new future.
Hugo Cho , choreographer recommended by Daniel, using the motif from classic Chinese Opera “三岔口-SAMCHAHOU-”, tries to describe divagating souls and bodies between seen/unseen in today’s society. A Chinese Opera Artist from Hong Kong, and 2 contemporary artists working on traditional performing arts from Japan will join residency, and 4 of them will depart to journey from Traditional to Contemporary.
Residence places are Okinawa and Sapporo. We are going to move from the southernmost to northernmost. Okinawa is the place, Okinawa classic dance and traditional performing arts are still alive, and many important rituals are remained. This is the place we can see the chaos of social issue clearly. This is the place we look for Asian bodies.
In Sapporo, 10 degrees colder place, we will held the work-in-progress showing what we have done in Okinawa., the different culture place.
We start journey to meet Asian Bodies with the unpredictable ship “AIR”.
Program Director: Ritsuko Mizuno