Festival Guest Artist: Kota Yamazaki (12:10 PM, 12:35 PM & 1:40 PM)

Born in Niigata, Japan, Kota Yamazaki was first introduced to butoh under the teaching of Akira Kasai at the age of 18. With the invitation from Germain Acogny to create a dance piece in collaboration with her Senegal-based company Jant-bi, Yamazaki disbanded his Tokyo-based company rosy co., which he led from 1995-2001. Since 2003, Yamazaki with New York-based Fluid hug-hug has been presenting work nationally and internationally. Yamazaki is a recipient of the Bessie Award of 2007, Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists award of 2013, NYFA Fellowship of 2016, and Guggenheim Fellowship of 2018 in United States. His latest production was nominated for Bessie Award 2018 as Outstanding Production, and named as one of the Best Production of 2017 in Dance Magazine. Yamazaki has been teaching around the world, in most recent years, at Sarah Lawrence College (NY) and UC Davis (CA), and currently teaches at Bennington College (VT). Yamazaki is the director of cross-disciplinary experimental performance arts festival, whenever wherever festival, in Tokyo since 2009.

Festival performances take place at the McKinley Amphitheater. Usdan will livestream select guest performances, which you can watch on Usdan's YouTube and Facebook pages and on our website. 

For more information on Festival, visit our Festival Performances page.