Tradition and Innovation: Dance Hakushu 2005. August twelfth through twenty-first, Body Weather Farm, Yamanashi, Japan.

Abstract

For the past seventeen years the town of Hakushu (recently re-named Hokuto-shi), a small farming village two hours west of Tokyo, has hosted a festival of avant-garde and traditional performing arts. The Dance Hakushu festival is based at Body Weather Farm, a working organic farm founded by dancer/choreographer Tanaka Min in 1985, and now run by some of the members of his group Tokason. This year’s festival featured traditional performance from India, Bali and Japan, as well as original group work by Tokason and Gekidan Kaitaisha (Theatre of Deconstruction). One of the most unusual aspects of the festival is the program of site-specific solo performances that take place each day under any weather conditions. Here, dancers are encouraged to challenge themselves through encounters with a variety of natural and constructed environments.