I have never seen a nightclub fall silent. All eyes are on a solitary female figure in white body paint, writhing under a spotlight. She’s almost unearthly, a ghostly pupa.
For many of those gathered in this cyberpunk-esque space, this is their first brush with butoh, an avant-garde form of dance that blends slow, deliberate movements with surreal and often grotesque imagery to explore themes of death, suffering and transformation.
Judging from the expressions of the crowd, the dancer, Kana Kitty, has won them over.
“My role is to be an entrance to butoh,” Kana, 36, tells me after the show at Hven. “People find butoh through me at a party and then go and discover more.”
One such convert is Joshua Zahren, a musician visiting Tokyo from Germany. He says he walked into Live Jazz Bar Donfan in the capital’s Otsuka neighborhood expecting jazz and found Kana performing instead. He’d never heard of butoh but tells me he’s eager to see it again.
Meanwhile, Kana believes she needs to seek out new audiences in unexpected places: nightclubs, raves, art galleries and, more recently, on social media. She runs the English-language Butoh Information account on Instagram to provide news about the dance form and upcoming shows, while also producing a video series for YouTube and Instagram called Butoh×Pops in which she performs butoh-like choreography to pop songs by the likes of Sia and Billie Eilish.
“She is a pop star for the future,” Kana says of Eilish, explaining that elements of her aesthetic circa her 2019 debut, “When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?” seem to draw inspiration from butoh: white eyes rolling around, spiders coming from her mouth, the buzz of a dentist’s drill. While it might not be butoh strictly speaking, I can see how there could be an audience crossover.
In fact, two weeks ago, the musician FKA Twigs premiered her new single and video, “Eusexua,” which features butoh-inspired dance. “Butoh is a virus” is one of Kana’s favorite phrases. And viruses spread fast online.
Taking to the streets
I’m at Kana’s apartment with her and choreographer Kohei Wakaba. We’re watching videos of Kana’s performances on her laptop. One clip shows her contorting her limbs as if she were a ghostly marionette hanging from invisible strings; another is of her outside, twisting in knots while trains on the Keio Line zoom by behind her.
“Maybe this is not proper butoh,” Kana says, before Wakaba jumps in. “No, no, this is good,” he says. “These movements are good!”
Wakaba, 43, is the founder and choreographer of the newly formed all-female butoh group Wozme. He says he first set out to assemble a group made up entirely of women because he saw more possibilities in choreographing for the female body. Kana was the first dancer he recruited.
Wozme is not Wakaba’s first foray into butoh, however. He spent 16 years in Dairakudakan, which, along with Sankai Juku, is one of two major butoh dance troupes presently operating in Japan. He made the choice to go independent in 2020, and last year launched his own contemporary dance company, Wakaba Coffee, with his partner, Mana Kawamura.
“There’s an anxiety in going freelance, but freedom is important,” he says, adding that many butoh companies tend to be closed, forbidding any collaborations. “I think butoh is declining because of such behavior.”
Kana says this closed-door attitude is why she never wanted to affiliate herself with a big group — she is fond of collaborations. She met Wakaba in 2022 as part of a dance theater performance based on the Ainu myth “Fukuro no Kami” (The Owl God). They talked and talked, discovering a shared desire to usher in a “new era” for butoh. They collaborated on a performance together, for the Sancha de Daidogei street art festival in Sangenjaya last year, and with Kana on board, Wakaba felt it would be easy to find more dancers for Wozme.
“The young women in the butoh scene here really admire her,” he says, adding that, in the local scene, Kana is like an idol or mini-celebrity who also performs the role of a senpai (senior) nurturing young talent.
Dancing goddesses
Since Wakaba had the experience and Kana the reputation, the pair reached out to three independent women dancers whose work they admired: Ami Ishii, Akane Watanabe and Natsuki, who goes only by her first name for privacy reasons. (Kana Kitty is also a stage name.)
“We all have different styles and expressions, but in Wozme we become something else,” Kana says of the quartet.
Wakaba came up with the name Wozme (pronounced “o-zu-me”), a variation of Ame-no-Uzume who is the Shinto goddess of the dawn and revelry. According to ancient myths, her dancing was the basis for the ritual Japanese dance called kagura, which is performed to this day as an act of communing with the gods.
While Wozme is far from the first troupe of female butoh dancers, Wakaba says the idea is still rare.
“I don’t think there is an active all-female group right now,” he says. “There have always been female butoh dancers, though, even since the time of (butoh founder) Hijikata. But the public image of butoh is usually of a man with a shaved head, and we want to change that.”
Choreographer Tatsumi Hijikata (1928-86) is regarded as one of the forefathers of butoh, alongside male dancer Kazuo Ohno (1906-2010). In 1952, Hijikata and his wife, dancer Akiko Motofuji (1928-2003), opened what would eventually be Asbestos Hall, a venue that became the epicenter of butoh and other arts. Hijikata’s students would go on to establish Dairakudakan, Sankai Juku and other troupes.
While Hijikata’s and Ohno’s styles differed — the former seeing butoh as a dead body standing up, while the latter dancing to transcend darkness — Hijikata choreographed for Ohno until his death.
Hokkaido University associate professor and butoh dancer Caitlin Coker confirms that all-women butoh groups are not new. The first performance she ever saw was by Shinonome Butoh, an all-female group that seems to be inactive as of 2021. While living in Kyoto in 2007, Coker joined Kiraza, another all-women group led by Tenko Ima.
“These groups can come together quickly, and often members change,” Coker says, pointing out how after a few of Kiraza’s members came and went, the group no longer comprises only women. She thinks it’s difficult to say 100% whether there are active all-female groups in Japan or abroad at the moment.
Wozme’s all-female membership is not meant to be a gimmick, however. The quartet wants to embrace femininity and bring concepts of elegance and beauty to what was originally dubbed ankoku butoh (butoh of darkness), anti-ballet and the choreography of skin and bones. Wakaba believes these so-called feminine traits will ultimately create a powerful juxtaposition with the ugliness that butoh has historically embraced.
“Sankai Juku is all-male, yet they have feminine elements in their performance, costumes and movements,” Natsuki says. “I’m excited about the way we as women can use femininity in Wozme. It can become quite the weapon, perhaps.”
By focusing on the feminine elements of the art and focusing less on the idea of trailblazing or empowerment, Wozme’s women members can also avoid the perception of being directed by the male gaze. The four women say they are collaborating with Wakaba in a non-hierarchical atmosphere. “He cares what we think,” Watanabe says. “His direction is open, flexible. I feel like we’re creating this new brand together.”
Kana agrees, adding, “Wakaba-san is working to understand women, to understand me.”
Perhaps not surprising for a group that takes its name from a Shinto deity, Wakaba is planning to explore the image of a miko (shrine maiden) for the group’s style. He then wants to cross it with the concept of “idols” in pop culture, admitting that he hopes to make butoh more mainstream.
The members say they are fully supportive of this vision, stressing that it is important that Wakaba strives to create an environment in which dancers can live off their art. If butoh can tackle taboo themes of suicide and death, there’s no reason it can’t face capitalism — to be paid your worth, after all, is to be empowered.
Butoh (r)evolution
Flirting with the mainstream is not new for butoh. “Butoh companies would often perform on television, doing the kinpun (gold powdered) show or other shows,” Coker says before adding that she is “also interested in the connection between butoh and cabaret. Butoh performers used to gather money for their activities by sending dancers to perform in cabaret clubs.”
Dairakudakan was one such group that performed kinpun shows in the 1970s and ’80s. At that time, its members also started performing at street festivals, attracting bigger audiences who had never seen butoh before. In that light, Kana’s raves and nightclub appearances continue the spirit of experimentation, evolution and survival.
The current generation of Millennial and Gen Z dancers in Japan believe they can go even further, however, formulating their paths based on the ichinin ippa (one dancer, one school) principle that posits every butoh artist should strive to be unique.
At the same time, Wozme’s dancers feel the butoh scene has been in decline. In 2021, the Kyoto Butoh-kan, the world’s first theater dedicated to butoh, closed its doors in part due to the pandemic. Tokyo-based dancers are frustrated with the fractured nature of the capital’s scene, which is dispersed around small, impermanent venues that are somewhat hard to find. There is also no definitive online resource where a person can find information on upcoming butoh performances. According to around a dozen dancers, choreographers and event organizers, word-of-mouth discoveries are still your best bet.
This past March also saw the death of Ushio Amagatsu, who cofounded Dairakudakan with thespian Akaji Maro and subsequently founded Sankai Juku. His passing marked “the end of an era,” according to Sankai Juku member and Danza Night organizer Taiki Iwamoto, but it has also led to the feeling that a shift in the scene is imminent, with Iwamoto adding that he believes his fellow artists will start creating new forms of butoh even if they can’t yet say what those will look like.
Those interested in what the next chapter of butoh might look like will want to head to Hokkaido, which will host an annual butoh festival for the first time since 2021. The Hokkaido Butoh Festival 2024 New Era, which focuses primarily on younger acts, will put on shows in Otaru and Sapporo on Oct. 19 and 20, respectively.
In Tokyo, Wozme is set to officially debut on Oct. 4 at a space called Kokashita Akisoko in Koenji, an area long-known as a countercultural hotspot. The group’s second appearance will be at the 2024 edition of the Sancha de Daidogei, which Kana and Wakaba attended last year.
Kana believes this year could mark a turning point for her generation’s contributions to this striking form of dance. “And Wozme is part of this wave,” she says.
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