Queer Butoh 2017

Howl! Happening in association with The New York Butoh Institute and Vangeline Theater present Queer Butoh 2017, a free three-hour evening of site-specific Butoh performances with three LGBT/Q Butoh artists from San Francisco, Chicago and New York: Angela Newsham, Holly Chernobyl, and Will Atkins. The event will take place on Thursday, October 19, 2017 at 6pm at Howl! Happening, 6 E. First Street, NYC. For more information, visit www.vangeline.com.

The artists will dance throughout the evening yet maintain a fluid space of interaction with the audience. The unique minimalist soundscape featured includes recordings of the artists in candid conversations about the role, which butoh has played in their lives. The installation will take place against the unique background of sculptures by Japanese artist Mazao Gozu.

“Butoh is essentially the dance of the marginalized, and the LGBTQ population is still largely marginalized in the world,” says Vangeline France, curator of this series. “Most of these artists feel that they found a place of freedom and acceptance through Butoh and it was important to give them a voice to express this.”

In Butoh, the desire to play with notions of both “masculine” and “feminine” has been expressed in performance methodology by both male and female artists. The five contemporary artists will create new work and speak about how they integrate Butoh into their art and lives.

At its origin, the introduction of Butoh in Japan was widely controversial. The first Butoh performance, Kinjiki (Forbidden Colors) created by Tatsumi Hijikata in 1958, shocked its spectators. Inspired by the work of homosexual author Jean Genet, Kinjiki took its name and inspiration from Yukio Mishima’s book Forbidden Color and dealt with homosexuality, a profoundly taboo subject at the time.

Holly Chernobyl has been a working artist for over a decade–her work spanning poetry, storytelling, bunraku puppetry, physical theater, and performance art. She has presented work in many Chicago spaces, including the Japanese Cultural Center. Her work has also been performed in Seattle, Brooklyn, Finland, Germany, the UK, and shown in Boston, Quebec and Brazil. She continues to create solo pieces and collaborate with a talented array of international artists, through her dance theater company, NIGHTPARADE. Recently, she was awarded a grant through the Finlandia Foundation, and a 2 month residency in Berlin-based Altes Finanzamt Atelier.

Born and raised on the island of Oahu, Angela Newsham developed a deep connection with nature. As a non-verbal learner she pays close attention to movement and creates art as a way to express her inquiries and connect with others. She is inspired by her work as a raptor rehabilitator in Oregon nurturing injured and orphaned birds of prey. She has trained extensively in Body Mind Centering with Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen and Sonja Riket, and in Butoh with Vangeline Theater in New York and San Francisco, Diego Pinon as well as Natsu Nakajima and Atsushi Takenouchi.