The Dances of Two Women Two Worlds

Midori Kashiwagi, an inimitable dancer/choreographer from Japan, known for dramatic dance theater merging two diverse cultures and dance styles – East and West, traditional and contemporary – returns to New York. Kashiwagi takes conventional Japanese subject matter, often from Noh and Kabuki, and creates eloquent and fierce narratives expressed by original dance fusion of Buyo, classical Japanese dance and Western modern and jazz dances.

The program includes the world premiere of Kashiwagi’s new work Love Elegy, a portrait of a courtesan struggling with genuine but unrequited love. Dressed in flamboyant Kimonos, Kashiwagi performs an elegant, exquisite and heart-wrenching Buyo solo depicting the tragic life of a doomed woman to a unique blend of modern Japanese music using ancient Asian instruments.

In Carmen, A Woman, Kashiwagi’s captivating interpretation of this timeless piece vividly focuses on the intense and fatal relationship between two lovers with her signature dance fusion. Supporting Kashiwagi in the title role of a femme fatale, the award-winning Buyo master Daiki Nishikawa strikingly expresses Carmen’s anguished lover Jose, who is entangled in a web of love, lust and deception. Carmen, A Woman was originally created in 2003 and received critical acclaim. Its today’s version has been premiered at the second Kamakura Art Festival in 2007.

Kashiwagi’s themes center on women’s lives, much like many of Martha Graham’s works. In this return engagement, Kashiwagi not only combines the dances of two worlds but also tells stories of two women in the attempt to explore distinctions in each as well as their universality.