Evocation of Butoh

This is the most marvelous opportunity to be entranced by world-renowned Butoh practitioner Yumiko Yoshioka, who brings her own unique form of Butoh. Butoh was first created in 1959 in Japan and has been a unique form of physical expression that is grounded in the grotesque and does not err from the abject and dark and taboo subjects.

Yumiko Yoshioka, who is from Tokyo but has lived in Germany since 1988, is the most extraordinary performer.  She is an exceedingly beautiful woman who has been practicing this grotesque dance/physical performance for approximately three decades.  Every muscle sinew and fiber of her body is given over to her method.  Such a strong toned body is mesmerizing to watch in action.

The work Before the Dawn is described in the program as ‘a dance of metamorphosis, where darkness melts into brightness.’ This is such an apt description of Yoshioka’s performance – a fluid piece in which transformations that are often sudden and remarkably crisp.  Semblances range from horror, distortion and disfigurement to achingly beautiful states of simplicity and acute human beauty.  Throughout the audience is transfixed.

The lighting (Bronwyn Pringle) is wonderful and assists in highlighting subtle changes in Ms Yoshioka’s physical and spatial placement.  Light is used to marvelous effect in changing colour and creating shafts of illumination for Ms Yoshioka to move and evoke in.

Sound is electronic and often sharp in nature.  It seems often to be the aberrant distortions of natural sounds that assists in creating an unnatural atmosphere that, in turn, accentuates the profoundly natural human form.

Suzanne Sandow