Ever wondered how a dance performance is created?
We’re releasing three new episodes of our original series Choreographer’s Cut, filmed as part of #DUFest22, starting with Japanese choreographer Saburo Teshigawara (KARAS).
In this episode, Saburo Teshigawara sits down with Dance Umbrella Artistic Director & CEO Freddie Opoku-Addaie, to discuss how he made his 2006 work Glass Tooth, which premiered at the New National Theatre Tokyo. In the piece, Teshigawara performs on a massive square of countless broken glass fragments.
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Uncountable broken pieces of glass reflect time
Bodies collide, hesitate, and paradox multiplies
Life appears in an unknown land
Fragments of glass are fragments of time
Melt beyond meanings
Saburo Teshigawara
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About Saburo Teshigawara
Saburo Teshigawara (Tokyo, 1953) is internationally recognised as one of the greatest contemporary choreographers. He began his career in 1981, in his native Tokyo, after studying plastic arts and classic ballet. In 1985, he formed KARAS with Kei Miyata, when he began choreographing himself as well as other artists and international companies. Beyond his work as a dancer and choreographer, he is also celebrated for his creations as a visual artist, designer and filmmaker.
Across the past four decades, Teshigawara and KARAS have been presented six times at Dance Umbrella festival, from Ishi-No-Hana (Stone Garden) at The Place in 1989, to Bones in Pages at Queen Elizabeth Hall (Southbank Centre) in 2004.
In 2022, he was awarded the 2022 Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Biennale.
Explore the Choreographer's Cut series
Since 2020, Dance Umbrella has had the privilege of speaking to numerous world class choreographers to gain a truly unique insight into their artistic practice and how they created particular dance works.
Be sure to catch-up on previous episodes of Choreographer’s Cut with:
- Dimitris Papaioannou on Primal Matter
- Oona Doherty on Hard to Be Soft – A Belfast Prayer
- Eun-Me Ahn on Dancing Grandmothers
- Claire Cunningham on Thank You Very Much
- nora chipaumire on portrait of myself as my father
- Eddie Ladd on Cof y corff/muscle memory