Dance UbuWebKo Murobushi (1947-2015)
The Centaur & The Animal (2012)Ko Murobushi was an acclaimed Butoh artist, who taught and per- formed worldwide. Butoh, influenced by European expressionism, shifted Japanese traditional dance to the artistic avant-garde of the 20th century postwar period. The founders were Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno, who fought conventions with the desire to reveal the truth of the human being in life and death. Over the years they developed their individual style of Butoh.
Butoh can involve playful and grotesque imagery, taboo topics, unusual environments, and is traditionally performed in white body makeup with slow controlled motion.
I met Ko Murobushi for the first time in the late 90s and had the opportunity to attend his workshops. Over the years I photo- graphed several of his creations in Europe and Japan, always drawn to his storytelling and exploration of the body.