Butoh in Six Acts Takes Centre Stage in Hong Kong

O ver four days in January 2025, Hong Kong witnessed an unprecedented congress of Butoh dancing at Sotheby’s Maison, featuring six seminal performances across three nights by Tadashi Endo, Ima Tenko, Yasuo Fukurozaka, Masami Yurabe with Miwako Inagaki, Yuri Nagaoka, and Seisaku.

For the first time ever, the ground floor of Sotheby's Maison was transformed into an experiential stage for performance. Attracting a full house every evening, audiences were given a rare opportunity to experience Butoh up close in an intimate setting unlike any other. Sponsored by Xevarion Institute and Nicolas Chow, Chairman of Sotheby’s Asia, in partnership with City University of Hong Kong’s School of Creative Media, Butoh in Six Acts was part of a four-day festival comprising Butoh performances, talks, and film screenings anchored by a comprehensive month-long exhibition at Catalyst Gallery curated by Takashi Morishita.

Read on below for a short introduction and history to this captivating dance form that is seeing a proliferating interest around the world today.

F ounded by dancers Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno, Butoh (Butō) is an avant-garde form of dance theatre that emerged in Japan in the 1950s as a radical disassociation to classical forms and a response to the devastation of World War II.

Influenced by postmodernist ideas that were permeating into the arts at the time, Butoh began as a rebellious provocation to the societal and cultural upheavals of the post-war era. Butoh was born out of death. Highly charged stillness and slow motions are often used to great effect in Butoh performances, creating a heightened state of awareness between dancer and audience. Dancers frequently appear as though bearing weakened bodies, with spines constricted or feet trembling.

Tatsumi Hijikata’s early performances were characterised by his raw, unsettling portrayals of human suffering and topics that were taboo, challenging audiences to come face to face with uncomfortable truths.

Hijikata was born Yoneyama Kunio in 1928 in Akita Prefecture in the northeast of Japan. Growing up in a country ravaged by war, Hijikata witnessed the reconstruction of Japan. Dubbed Ankoku Butoh (“Dance of Darkness”), Hijikata’s structured choreographies were compelling and surrealist, a reinterpretation of his traditional Japanese dance training that shook the roots of society through its confrontation of the human experience and interrogation of his own Japanese identity.

Kazuo Ohno on the other hand could not have been more different to Hijikata when it came to outlook on life and expression. While Hijikata was anti-Western, refusing to train foreigners or perform outside of Japan, Ohno was a Christian and embraced the West, performing all around the world. Hijikata developed a method of strict choreography, Ohno preferred improvisation. Where Hijikata came to represent anti-establishment, Ohno was quite the opposite.

Ohno was born in 1960 in the Hokkaido Prefecture in the northernmost part of Japan. By the time a young Hijikata saw him, Ohno was already trained in German Expressionist dance and performing modern Japanese dance. In contrast to Hijikata’s method, Ohno’s dance was delicate, subtle at times. They came to represent the yin and yang of Butoh dance.

The expression of Butoh is not one that can be codified. Unlike other forms of dance, there is no formal technique or style, and its expressions are abundant. While Butoh was founded at a tumultuous time in Japan’s history, Butoh’s various interpretations today carries themes of renewal and rebirth. Spanning from a minimalist expression to the theatrical and grotesque, Butoh today has a truly manifold existence. Striking a contemporary global resonance, Butoh offers profound insights into themes of renewal emphasising the transformation potential of the human body, reflecting cycles of life, death, and rebirth.

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