About
I’m an independent Butoh and contemporary dancer, teacher, choreographer, and performer living in Germany.I was born in 1981 in Soviet Estonia, but my family’s roots come from the Finnish tribe Inkeri, so, after the end of the Soviet Union, my family moved back to Finland.
When I was a little girl I used to dance in front of the shiny cupboard door. I could see my reflection. I felt like I was flying. I was used to going, with my best friend and my dear little sister, to the construction sites in the Soviet Union Kohtla-Järve, and there creating performances for dogs and cats.
When I was 10 years old my fascination with movement led me to train in dance: Jazz, street dance, ballet, and show dance. I studied at the Roehampton University of London, the Northern School of Contemporary Dance, and the Theatre Academy of Helsinki. I started to explore other forms of art in movement, like clownerie, with Slava Polunin; Brazilian Orisha dance, with Nina Dipla; street theatre, with the community antagon theaterAKTion, and I got captured by Butoh.
Butoh, with its early name Ankoku Butō (暗黒舞踏, "Dance of Darkness"), is a dance theater without a fixed form. It originated in Japan after the Second World War, as a reaction to the horror of war and an act of resistance towards the modern society’s forms and values, coming from the United States. Its aim is not to reach some canonic ideals or to represent forms, but to connect to our life source, through a deep acceptance and listening of the body. If you want to know more about Butoh, check my master Atsushi Takenouchi’s website.
Special thanks to my teachers: Atsushi Takenouchi, Hiroko Komiya, Shusaku Takenuchi, Nina Dipla, Anton Adasinski, Slava Polunin and the community antagon theaterAKTion.
Curriculum
- 1999 - 2001 “Helsingin Kuvataidelukio” School of Fine Arts in Helsinki
- 2002 – 2006 BA hons. Dance Studies (2.1) University of Roehampton, London. Trained in Graham, Limon, Release, Cunningham and Classical Ballet.
- 2005 – 2007 Graduate Diploma in Professional Contemporary Dance Performance, The Northern School of Contemporary Dance, Leeds. Trained in Graham, Release, Cunnigham and Classical Ballet Apprentiship as a dancer in the production of dance company “Tilted Production” choreographer Maressa von Stockert, London.
- 2007 – 2008 Aleksanteri Teatteri Helsinki “Tiloja Tanssille” professional training in contemporary and classical dance with Aapo Aaltokoski, Jyrki Karttunen, Petri Kekori, Arja Raatikainen, Kirsi Monni, Katri Soini
- 2008 -2012 MA in Dance- and Theater- pedagogie, Theater Academy, Helsinki
- 2008 – 2010 Helsingin Ashtanga Joogakoulu. Daily Ashtanga yoga practice of full first series.
- 2011 – 2021 Antagon TheaterAKTion Frankfurt am Main. Dancer, acrobat, acterss, performer, teacher and choreographer. Being part of six big scale outdoor productions and developing two of them. Toured to /pazil, Mexico, Russia, Italy, Romania, Spain, Czech Republic, Poland, Germany. Organizer of yearly “Night of Dance”. Programme in Sommerwerft International Theater Festival Frankfurt am Main.
- 2007 – 2021 Participated in several project of Slava Polunin. Performing as a green clown in “Slava’s Snow Show” tours in Galsgow, Liverpool, Toulouse, London, Hawai “Stairway to Heaven” 2007, “Mir Caravan” 2010 Moscow, “Fools in the Desert” The Burning Man Festival Nevada 2009 and several projects at the “Yellow Mill” as a dancer / performer.
- 2010 -2021 working with choreographer Shusaku Takenuchi “Bodytorium” in productions “Buttefly”, “Package”, “Poro”, “Spiderweb” and “Ice – Regentrude”.
- 2012 – 2021 student of a Jinen Butoh, Atsushi Takenouchi and Hiroko Komiya
- 2020 – 2021 Theaterproductions with the musician and composer Marja Burchard “Regentrude“, “Schatten vergessener Ahnen“, “Poro“, “Cage”, “Spiderweb” as a dancer, choreographer in collaboration with the choreographer and dancer Shusaku Takeuchi from Japan/Neitherland.
- 2021 teacher of Jinen Butoh in TUT – Hannover.