The Body as a Vessel
A BUTOH Workshop with Yael Karavan
May 16th to 18th 2025
SerVivo – Palmela – Portugal
No
Light
without
Darkness
searching for the beauty
Beauty
in the
Grotesque
2 1/2 days
of Butoh
in constant transformation
“I run a shop of the body, my profession, known under the name of dancer, is an enterprise of restoration of the human.”
“We should live in the present. We should do what we have to do now and not keep putting it on the long finger as the majority of adults do. That is why they exhaust themselves. For children, there is only the present. They are not afraid. Fear envelops us in a fine mesh. We must remove this mesh”
Tatsumi Hijikata, Butoh co-founder
Butoh
Butoh is the dance of becoming, in constant transformation, but before we can begin to being danced, we need to find out how to ’empty’ our vessel in order to be available. To become a tool, an instrument of the universe and of all life. In this workshop we will explore how to travel from full to empty, life and death, inside and outside, between form and soul. Exploring the present body, empty body, the body as a vessel and the transformation of our physical states with powerful images.
Butoh is an avant-garde, radical, revolutionary dance of transformation, which emerged at the end of the 50ese in Japan, it is not a technique but rather a method and a philosophy, an approach to dance that is born within us and connects us to our essence, nature, universe and the cycles of life and death.
Yael Karavan
Performer, teacher, director
Questioning how Butoh can be translated into a European Body and why Butoh is extremely relevant nowadays, Yael Karavan shares more than 25 years of Butoh experience, during which she had the opportunity to work with founders of Butoh in Japan, Kazuo Ohno and Motofuji San – wife of T. Hijikata – as well as with Tadashi Endo and MAMU dance theatre, Yumiko Yoshioka and Ten-Pen-Chi, Sankai Juku, Minako Seki, Carlota Ikeda, Akira Kasai, Ko Morobushi and Natsu Nakajuma among others.
Practicalities
The Workshop starts at 4pm on Friday 16th May, you are invited to arrive from 2pm on.
It ends on Sunday 18th May around 4pm.
Price: 190€ – 260€ sliding scale. From 15th April on 210€ – 260€.
Including:
- Accommodation in a dormitory. (There are few private accommodations available for additional 15€ per night).
- Organic food. (The first meal will be dinner on Friday, the last lunch on Sunday).
The venue:
SerVivo is nested in the Arrábida nature park, 40min. South of Lisbon. It’s easy to get there, here are the directions.
