5 day Intensive Butoh Performance Workshop
DATES:
7 - 11 December 2026 12:00-18:00
(WS presentation on 11 December at 18:00)
VENUE: Eden Studios, Breite Str. 43, 13187 BERLIN
Studio, 190 EG
450 Euro (420 Euro paid by 31 October)
Info + Registration: info@cokaseki.com
What shape am I?
Impulse gives birth to form.
Pain and joy briefly surface, then dissolve, flowing into new movement.
We create and destroy—gathering fragments, breaking them apart, piecing them together again.
Between these fragments, emotion leaks out, quietly shaping a new self.
From where, what, how, where to?
We gaze deeply inward— and from there, radiate light outward.
Butoh is a comprehensive art form: infinitely personal, yet unmistakably universal.
It is a dance that affirms existence itself.
In this workshop, we focus on the creation of a solo performance.
Ideas, composition, body, costume, space, sound—
we balance and subtract, stripping away excess to arrive at something essential.
Through synthesis, each participant shapes an original work:
a manifestation of deepest desire, a cry, prayer.
Each participant brings a seed—an image, question, or impulse.
From there, the process unfolds collectively.
We stimulate one another, witness one another, and allow transformation to occur.
Together, we dig deep—into what attracts us, what disturbs us, what remains unanswered.
Through this excavation, movement emerges—not as decoration, but as necessity.
WORKSHOP DETAILS:
Following Yuko Kaseki’s continuous research with various physical training methods such as Noguchi gymnastics, elements of Tai-Chi Dao-yin, Butoh methodology, Dance Improvisation, and Live Art, the workshop is aiming to develop original movement through body awareness, sensitivity, and also discover hidden dynamic energy.
Finding the core of our body (Tanden), which is our energy source, listening honestly to the variants of the Inner- and develop this in relation to the Outer-world, will be an ongoing focus point. Direct physical connection with the others and the space will stimulate and enhance physical imagination and help accumulate a vocabulary of movement and practical action.
Participants are encouraged to discover authentic movement of own Self from a deeper sense, through playful Improvisation with imagination of elements, essence of quality, gravity, scale, dimension, directionality... searching balance between both extremes of tense and release, silence and chaos, strong presence and disappearance... sharing personal experience of survival in the shape of movement becomes the main ingredient of a collective dance improvisation.
Yuko Kaseki is director, choreographer, Butoh dancer, performance artist, improviser and teacher, based in Berlin. She teaches and performs in solo and ensemble pieces and improvisations through out 30 countries. These works are poetic and vivid images that incorporate the spirit of Butoh, performance and live art. Her performance aims to reflect the outsider’s existence.
cokaseki.com
Photo: Kuniya Oyamada