Butoh musing with Vangeline

The Body as a Vessel: Conversation with Butoh dancer Genevieve Jencson and students in Cleveland, Ohio after a 3-day Butoh workshop led by Vangeline.Recorded in Cleveland on April 27, 2025.https://www.instagram.com/genevieve_violet/

In this podcast interview recorded at Zen Mountain Monastery, Monastic Hokyu Aronson speaks with Vangeline about embodied movement and healing. Along the way, they discuss some of the deep history of butoh and how trauma-informed guidance can help students settle their nervous systems, whether they are pursuing Zen, butoh, or life itself. Although Vangeline emphasizes this approach in her teaching, and speaks widely on the benefits of butoh as a form of creative engagement, she is quick to add that butoh should not be considered a replacement for therapy, and nor should Zen practice. That said, the movement workshops she leads, explore the body as a vehicle for working with challenging emotions, accessing deeper connection, and finding freedom. The Mountains and Rivers Order (MRO) is a Western Zen Buddhist lineage established by the late John Daido Loori Roshi and dedicated to sharing the dharma as it has been passed down, generation to generation, since the time of Shakyamuni Buddha. https://zmm.org/about/about-mountains-and-rivers-order/ This episode is also available on the ZMM podcast: https://zmm.org/podcast/vangeline-butoh/

This episode was recorded on December 15, 2024. in Zipolite, Mexico, as the conclusion of a 7-day Butoh immersive retreat at the Butoh Sanctuary where Vangeline guided 18 students from all over the world to create their own Butoh piece. In this episode, you can listen to each participant's experience during our final circle. This episode is both in English and Spanish with some interpretation. To learn more about Butoh Sanctuary, visit www.butohsanctuary.org

In this episode, while in Rome, Vangeline had a conversation with dancer, performer, and visual artist Melissa Lohman, talking about the body, dance, Butoh, and the practice of Noguchi Taiso. You can follow Melissa on Instagram @melissarlohman https://www.melissalohman.com/

In this episode recorded in Denmark, I had a conversation with actress Christine Albeck Borge and Ballet dancer and choreographer Oliver Marcus Starpov, following our week-long creative research project combining Butoh, theater, and dance, with also director Liv Helm. Here is our reflection on the interaction of Butoh, dance, and theater. https://www.instagram.com/allmyfriendsaresuperheroes/ https://www.instagram.com/christinealbeck/ @livhelm

In this episode recorded during the New York Butoh Festival 2024, Butoh dancers and teachers Eugenia Vargas from Mexico, Natalia Cuellar from Chile, and Doctor Alice Baldock from Oxford University and I had a conversation about women and Butoh, Butoh in Latin America, and our relationship to Butoh as women. Get to know these extraordinary women who play a very important role in advancing the art form in the world. Read their biographies here: https://www.vangeline.com/calendar-of-upcoming-events/2024/10/14/panel-discussion-women-latin-america-and-butoh

In this episode, you can listen to the Q&A after Vangeline's performance of the Slowest Wave in Singapore, organized by the butoh artist XUE and the Singapore Butoh Collective. During the Q&A, Xue, the audience, and Vangeline talk about topics such as the difficulty in describing Butoh, Butoh and neuroscience, The Slowest Wave, and the present and future of Butoh in Singapore. This episode was recorded on September 1st, 2024. Check them out: https://sgbutoh.co/ A couple of corrections: The first Butoh performance was Kinjiki, or Forbidden Ciolors, not Forbidden Flowers. Also, The two women neuroscientists who collaborated on the Slowest Wave, neuroscientists Sadye Paez and Constantina Theofanopoulou, dance flamenco, not tango. If you want to learn more about the Slowest Wave, read here: https://www.vangeline.com/research

In this episode, Vangeline has a conversation with her collaborator Emmy-Award winner Machine Dazzle, discussing their new project "Venus Ex Machina", costumes for MAN WOMAN, life as an artist, and the importance of saying yes. For more information about this new project visit www.vangeline.com and Instagram Instagram: @machinedazzle @vangelinebutoh https://www.vangeline.com/news/2024/8/15/venus-ex-machina-machine-dazzle-and-vangeline Machine Dazzle. Emmy award winner and beloved downtown bon vivant and all-around creative provocateur Machine Dazzle has been dazzling stages via costumes, sets, and performances since his arrival in New York in 1994. An artist, costume designer, set designer, singer/songwriter, art director, and maker, Machine describes himself as a radical queer emotionally driven, instinct-based concept artist and thinker trapped in the role of costume designer, sometimes. Machine designs intricate, unconventional wearable art pieces and bespoke installations. As a stage designer, Machine has collaborated with artists from the New York downtown scene and beyond – including Julie Atlas Muz, Big Art Group, Mx. Justin Vivian Bond, Taylor Mac, Basil Twist, Godfrey Reggio, Jennifer Miller, The Dazzle dancers, Big Art Group, Mike Albo, Stanley Love, Soomi Kim, Pig Iron Theatre Company, Opera Philadelphia, the Bearded Ladies Cabaret, the Curran Theatre, and Spiegelworld; and has created bespoke looks for fashion icons including designer Diane von Furstenberg and model Cara Delevingne for the 2019 Metropolitan Museum of Art Gala. Machine's costumes and sets were featured in Taylor Mac's Pulitzer Prize-nominated A 24-Decade History of Popular Music. A documentary feature film directed by Jeffrey Friedman and Rob Epstein and co-produced by Pomegranate Arts will premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2023. In 2019, Machine was commissioned by Guggenheim Works and Process and The Rockefeller Brothers to create Treasure, a rock-and-roll cabaret of original songs including a fashion show inspired by the content. Recent collaborations include the Catalyst Quartet on Bassline Fabulous – a reimagining of Bach's Goldberg Variations at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and his debut collaboration with Opera Lafayette, for the historic premiere of the never-before-seen Rameau comedic opéra-ballet, Io. Dazzle was a co-recipient the 2017 Bessie Award for Outstanding Visual Design, the winner of a 2017 Henry Hewes Design Award, and a 2022 United States Artists Fellow. He delivered a TED Talk at TED Vancouver in 2023. Machine Dazzle's work has been exhibited internationally. His first solo exhibition, Queer Maximalism x Machine Dazzle, was held at the Museum of Arts and Design in New York City in 2022. https://www.vangeline.com/ https://www.pomegranatearts.com/projects-and-artists/machine-dazzle https://www.hbo.com/movies/taylor-macs-24-decade-history-of-popular-music

This episode focuses on the making of the duet Man Woman by butoh dancers Akihito Ichihara and Vangeline during their choreography residency at the Monira Foundation in New Jersey in July 2024. In the first part of this episode, Akihito Ichihara and Vangeline have a conversation about MAN WOMAN. The second half takes you behind the scenes of their creative process as they discuss the piece, section by section, for the sound artist composing the soundscape. About my guest and collaborator: Akihito Ichihara is a renowned Butoh dancer (Sankai Juku, ELF). To learn more about MAN WOMAN visit https://www.vangeline.com/news/2024/7/10/vhzk6zy97x0uhmu7kkzwrx5vryork8

In this episode recorded on July 8, 2024, Vangeline and Danish actress Marie Bach Hansen and Christine Albeck Børge discuss the many possibilities of Butoh after meeting in Florence Italy during a Butoh workshop led by Vangeline and organized by Wade Dance. They also discuss how beneficial gentle butoh techniques can be to actors and performers. For more information about Christine Albeck Børge, go to https://www.allthatmanagement.dk/klient.php?kid=129&tid=2&lang=da&p=showreel For more information about Marie Bach Hansen, go to: https://www.instagram.com/missmariebach/ www.vangeline.com

This second episode focuses on Butoh, Sensitivity, Sensuality, and the Nervous System, and is an audio recording of my video lecture on the subject. This episode also explores Butoh and eroticism, the history of women in Butoh, and Feminism.

Listen to three short preambles by Vangeline recorded on each day of her last 3-day zoom workshop focusing on the art of listening in Butoh. These reflections are meant to support Butoh practitioners with their Butoh practice and give context on Butoh as an art form.