An evening of butoh, live music and film with Joan Laage/Kogut Butoh and musicians Bill Horist, Michael Shannon, David Stanford, Joey Largent and special guest Katrina Wolfe.
Dance for 9 Corpses
Joan Laage/Kogut Butoh & Katrina Wolfe with Michael Shannon, David Stanford & Joey Largent
Manhattan October (2022)
Film by Michael Shannon
Piercing Heart
Joan Laage/Kogut Butoh with Bill Horist
Known as Kogut Butoh, Joan Laage has been performing, teaching butoh and collaborating with area and international performers since she settled in Seattle in 1990 after studying butoh with masters Kazuo Ohno and Yoko Ashikawa and performing in Ashikawa’s second company Gnome in Tokyo. Her group Dappin’ Butoh was well-known in the Seattle Fringe Theater Festival for 10 years and spawned many area butoh artists. Joan is a founding member of DAIPAN butoh Collective which produces an annual butoh festival. In spring 2023, Joan had a 3-night run in New York City and will return to perform in En Chair et En Son Acousmatic Festival in Paris for the second year in November.
Joey Largent’s work focuses on exploring long-duration compositions and improvisations for acoustic ensembles and solo performance. Beyond generating music alone, his goal is to offer a space for introspection, releasing from attachment, beauty, and connection. He has collaborated with numerous dancers, musicians, and interdisciplinary artists over the years, and has studied North Indian Classical singing with several disciples of Pandit Pran Nath, primarily Michael Harrison and Rose Okada.
Bill Horist has been making guitar music from the fringes of experimental technique to the pop/rock/jazz mainstream. He has performed throughout Europe, Japan, North /Central America and has appeared on over 100 recordings. His work also finds home in film, dance, and video games. Bill and Joan performed Piercing Heart in DAIPAN’s Summer Fest: Shimmer last June at YAW Theater.
Michael Shannon offers performance and recordings of his discoveries into the nature of sound’s ontology through the use of strings and wind instruments (Asian, African, and western), electronics, field/studio recordings, and sound objects. Further research into innately occurring abstraction is presented in films and video.
Originally from Massachusetts, David Stanford’s musical creations include soundtracks, Electronic and Classical. He studied at Cornish College of the Art. David has played with Brendan Murray, Jason Lescalleet, Animist Orchestra, Eye Music, and Gyre along with Michael Shannon and Carl Liermann, an experimental electronics trio formed in January 2012, which has performed for Joan’s Wandering & Wondering event in the Seattle Japanese Garden and Kubota Garden.
Katrina Wolfe is a performer and visual artist primarily focused on the practice, teaching and performance of Masukhuma: a movement therapy, dance, and performance art technique that Katrina has developed from her experience in Butoh, visual arts, and her daily practice of Vipassana meditation. Katrina’s most in-depth Butoh study occurred between 2012 and 2014 with Joan Laage and Atsushi Takenouchi. She integrates her visual art with her performance work by creating installations and costumes made from organic and recycled materials, and by capturing the practice of Masukhuma through photography and filmmaking.