Butoh Workshop with Maki Watanabe
Sunday 5th of July | 10:00-14:00
Monday 6th of July | 16:00-20:00
at Dance House Lefkosia
Dance workshop with Paris-based Japanese Butoh dancer and teacher Maki Watanabe
Inspired by contemporary Japanese Butoh dance, Maki will introduce in this workshop her unique approach to dance, movement and embodied attention. The workshop is open to everyone who is curious about dance, movement, perception, and presence. Developed in connection with the broader In Presence multi-art project (2026), this Butoh workshop will explore movement and dance and its ability to transmit a sensory language that connects bodies, images and space. In Butoh practice, movement becomes a form of “poetry in the air,” whereby bodily expressions can emerge from inner images.
The workshop offers an introduction to Butoh dance and encourages participants to become more attentive to the way they move through space and its environment, including through dance, actions and interactions.
Participants will be guided by Maki’s teaching, including the exploration of various types of exercises that allow for the experience and emergence of new forms of presence and perception. Butoh dance emphasizes the listening to your body, to engage with your imagination, and to explore a sensitivity towards the awareness of time and space.
Sunday 5th of July | 10:00 – 14:00
Monday 6th of July | 16:00 – 20:00
€90 for both days (2 x 4 hours) / €50 for one day (4 hours)
Concessionary rate for students / €60 for both days / €30 for one day
Registration by 01/07
https://forms.gle/
Butoh dancer, choreographer, and teacher
Born on January 28, 1976, in Sendai, Japan, Maki Watanabe entered the world of Butoh dance in 1995 after an initial training in modern jazz dance. She was introduced to Butoh by Kazuo Ohno, Masaki Iwana, and Marie Kazue.
Based in Paris since 1998, she has developed numerous improvised and experimental performances as well as choreographic creations. At the same time, she has performed in works by choreographers such as Gyohei Zaitsu, Naomi Moth, and Katy Roulaud, among others. She also collaborates with musicians and filmmakers.
Since 2010, she has regularly led workshops in Paris as well as intensive training sessions in France and abroad, including in Brazil and the Democratic Republic of Congo. From January to March 2025, she taught at the Conservatory of Theatre in Liège, Belgium.
Her workshops and training sessions are spaces for exchange, research, and learning through dance and the body. In her practice, becoming animals, flowers, birds, the wind, or the rain is something fundamental, and poetry plays an essential role. Dancing in public is also an important element. Through dance, participants seek a deeper understanding of life. The body and its movements are observed as they are.
Among her recent solo creations:
• Couleurs de vie — 2024
• Tout le monde a des choses invisibles — 2024
• Au vent du printemps — 2023
• Début de la floraison des cerisiers — 2022
• Dialogue éternelle — 2021
• Furyu — 2021
• Enfin comme une fleur (directed by Gyohei Zaitsu) — 2018
• Comme ça — 2016
• En regardant le ciel — 2015
• For a far star, for a close star — 2012
• Pour une nouvelle fleur — 2012
• Eternal season — 2010
• Un chat mort me nourrit — 2009
• I wonder — 2009
• Enfants-Loups (choreography by Gyohei Zaitsu) — 2008
• Un battement d’un papillon — 2002