Akiko Kitamura (Title: Choreographer, dancer, associate professor at Shinshu University’s Faculty of Arts)

During her course of study at Waseda University, she went to Berlin under the Agency for Cultural Affairs Overseas Study Program in 1995. She presented commissioned pieces in 2001 at the Bates Dance Festival in the USA and in 2003 at the American Dance Festival in the USA. In 2001 one of her master pieces finks was created. Since then it has been staged in a number of cities, and in 2005 was awarded best dance work by the Montreal magazine Hour. In 2005 her commissioned work Ghostly Round for the Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin received rave reviews in countries worldwide.
She also proactively engages in the choreography and performance of overseas works, such as at ACE dance and music (England, 2007 and 2011), and Art Zoyd (France, 2009 and 2010). In 2011 she began the international coproduction To Belong project with an Indonesian art organization, and stages a new piece every year in Jakarta, Tokyo, Kobe, Chino and Singapore. In 2014 at Dance New Air she presented To Belong/Suwung (3-5 October at the Aoyama enkei Theatre), and in December she succeeded in taking the production to Indonesia. In the same year, she received Best Performance award in the Indonesian magazine Tempo for choreography on the international co-production of Indonesian opera, Gandari Dance Opera (12 and 13 December 2014, Theater Jakarta). In fiscal 2013-2014 she was in charge of general production and coordination for the Agency for Cultural Affairs Program for the Promotion of Culture and Art at Shinshu University. In 2015 she received the Asian Cultural Council Japan’s Fellowship Grant to Individuals for the Japan-United States Arts Program.