Dance
Ayaka Nakama
The Odoriba Legend
How are modern legends born?
Numerous legends (unconfirmable anomalous experiences) related to dance have been created and passed down within Kansai’s contemporary dance scene. This year, internationally active Ayaka Nakama presents a new piece which takes as its starting point these phenomena, which, left undocumented in history, can only be captured through oral traditions.
This piece is created through a kind of sociological approach: interviewing people familiar with the legends of Kansai dance history, researching the social climate of the time and the legends around dance, deconstructing these legends by charting a chronology, archiving the phenomena, and reconstructing exhibitions and performances.The work is presented at Gekijo, a temporary theater constructed on a vacant lot in Kyoto City.
How can a dance transcend space and time and be remembered by a certain community or people living in a particular region? We hope you’ll join us to witness the beginnings of this huge experiment!
【Events schedule details】
Various performances and events will unfold during the dates.
Click ☞ here for a detailed exhibition and performance schedule PDF.
10.9 (Mon)-10.14 (Sat) 11:00-20:00
10.15 (Sun) 11:00-18:00
No performance: 10.12 (Thu)
Re-entry to the performance at any time.
⚠️This work will go ahead rain or shine! Please bring your own rain gear.
Please note performances may be changed or canceled due to weather conditions.
The festival will prepare some seating at the venue however you may be required to stand if seating is full.
Audiences are also welcome to bring their own portable chair.
Ayaka Nakama
Kobe
Born in Oita Prefecture in 1992, Nakama is a dancer based in Kobe, Japan. After training at the Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Dance (London) she took part as a scholarship student in a dance study program in Kobe organized by the Agency for Cultural Affairs and NPO Dance Box. She has worked with Mika Kurosawa, Reina Kimura, contact Gonzo and Toshiki Okada (chelfitsch) among others. While committed to the way the body is choreographed by someone or something, she pursues a phenomenon that she believes can only be called dance. In recent years she has been actively focused on the creation of her own works. Her work Freeway Dance (2019), which premiered at Dance Box, has since been presented at Performing Arts Meeting in Yokohama 2020 (TPAM 2020), Kyoto Experiment 2021 Spring, Kunstenfestivaldesarts (2021) and Center Pompidou (2021) among others. From 2018 to 2020 she was an associate artist at Dance Box. In 2022, she won the 16th Kobe Nagata Culture Encouragement Prize. She is a Saison Foundation ‘Saison Fellow I’ from 2022-2023.
Composition, Peformance, and Choreography for “Marginal Dance”: Ayaka Nakama
Dramaturge: Tomonori Fujisawa
Interviewee: Hajime Uchiyama, Kitamari, Fuyuki, Hiroyuki Haji, Kazushi Murakami, Ritsuko Mizuno, Monochrome Circus
Scenography: Garage (Mizuho Watanabe, Kenji Seo, Hayao Odagiri)
Music performance: Wolves Band (Bunsho Nishikawa, Hironari Sakashita (pepe), Shunsuke Manabe)
Stage Management: Kazushi Ota
Lighting: Yasuhiro Fujiwara
Sound: Bunsho Nishikawa
Choreography for “Traveling to the Wind”: Fuyuki
Choreography for “RED MAN today”: Kazushi Murakami
Performance for “RED MAN today”: Ryonosuke Endo, Kazushi Murakami
Performance in video works: Minetaka Matsuda, Kino Ishiyama
Artists/Companies renting 'Gekijo' for open rehearsals: Haru Otani, Mariya Takechiyo, yakushadenai, Tomomi Yokoo
'Gekijo' Staff: Miharu Komatsu, Keisuke Nakamura
Archive and Official Publication: Kota Yamada
Cooperation in construction: Hidetoshi Inanaga, Motomu Watanabe, Yuichiro Shiomi
Special Thanks: Blueberry Garden Kuroiwa, Christopher Giffard, Akiko Nakama, Aya Ishi
Production Management: Satoko Shibata
Production Coordinator: Shunsuke Manabe
In co-operation with Kamogawa Delta Festival, Kyoto Student Theater Festival 2023 and DANCE BOX
Produced by Ayaka Nakama
Co-produced by Kyoto Experiment
Supported by The Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan, through the Japan Arts Council, Japan Foundation for Regional Art Activities [Thinking about the body, history and identity through the performing arts], The Saison Foundation
Presented by Kyoto Experiment
