Earth Tomes

Grange Hall Cultural Center presents a world traveled production of EARTH TOMES: A Butoh Dance Performance, directed and performed by Joan Laage, master butoh trainer and performer, and also featuring Sophia Solano and Cosmo Rapaport, originally from Duxbury, Vermont, June 4 @ 7:30pm.

Grange Hall Cultural Center is proud to present this performance of EARTH TOMES in its Vermont debut June 4 at 7:30pm, directed by Seattle-based choreographer and performer Joan Laage // Kogut Butoh. The project began in 2015 and was first performed in Malmo, Sweden as part of the Somatic Archiving Symposium. The piece then went on to be performed in Norway, Poland, Germany and in England at London’s Hackney Showroom and Liverpool’s Capstone Theatre. This Production of Earth Tomes at The Grange Hall Cultural Center will be danced by Cosmo Rapaport, Sophia Solano, and Joan Laage // Kogut Butoh.

In an era of hyper-digitization and disconnection from nature, EARTH TOMES offers a visceral revelation of the body as Earth and, through continual transformation, reveals the changing Landscapes of the body. 

Butoh, is a movement art which incorporates elements of Surrealism, French Existentialism, German Expressionism, Japanese theater and Eastern spiritual thought, and has been described as an avant-garde, iconoclastic form of dance developed in the late 1950’s after World War II, through experimental collaborations between its founders Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno.

Seattle journalist and art critic Sharon Cumberland writes: “For those who have never seen a Butoh dance performance, Earth Tomes is a perfect introduction. Joan Laage’s style is so rooted, elemental, and organic that it felt like the flow of the earth, as fascinating as lava oozing from the earth's core... The slow evolution of ideas as dancers merge into and out of the center movement allows your busy brain to rest, and your heart and soul to engage deeply in the organic movement unfolding before you.”

Joan Laage will also be holding Butoh training workshops on

June 5 @ the Contemporary Dance Studio , Montpelier, Vermont

June 10 & 11 @ Nataraja Studio, Burlington, Vermont

ABOUT THE DIRECTOR:

Joan Laage // Kogut Butoh is a choreographer, performer and dance educator who is regarded by many as a pioneer of Butoh in the Pacific Northwest.  While living in Japan for nearly a decade, Joan studied extensively with Butoh artist Yoko Ashikawa (the major disciple of Butoh founder Tatsumi Hijikata) and with world-renowned Butoh master Kazuo Ohno in Tokyo. Joan performed with Yoko Ashikawa’s legendary Butoh troupe, Gnome, throughout the 1980’s and she has also trained with Japanese artist Atsushi Takenouchi.  In addition to over 30 years of teaching and thousands of performances over the years, Joan Laage is responsible for bringing the art form of Butoh to Seattle in 1990, when she and her husband moved here from Japan, and decided to launch the first ever Seattle International Butoh Festival.

Joan continues to perform internationally and has been a featured artist at national and international Butoh festivals, including the New York Butoh Festival and the UCLA Butoh Symposium in May 2011. Her pioneering PhD dissertation research titled “Embodying The Spirit: The Significance of the Body in the Japanese Contemporary Dance Movement of Butoh” has been presented at dozens of academic conferences and symposiums around the world.  Joan also performs annually at the Seattle Japanese Garden, where she is a docent, and at the Kubota Garden Foundation. Joan's work is highlighted in the award-winning books “DANCING INTO DARKNESS: BUTOH, ZEN AND JAPAN” & “Butoh: Metamorphic Dance and Global Alchemy.”

**SCHEDULE OF EVENTS**

EARTH TOMES

Performed by Joan Laage, Sophia Solano, and Cosmo Rapaport

June 4 @ 7:30pm

Grange Hall Cultural Center

$20

Tickets for the EARTH TOMES performance can be found at sevendaystickets.com or by contacting grangehallcc@gmail.com or 802-244-4168.

Butoh training workshops on:

June 5 @ the Contemporary Dance Studio , Montpelier, Vermont

June 10 & 11 @ Nataraja Studio, Burlington, Vermont

Please contact dance studios for info and registration for classes.

Contact grangehallcc@gmail.com with any questions or to receive submission forms and guidelines or go online to: