Diana Garcia-Snyder performs, promotes, and teaches about Butoh
IAS faculty member Diana Garcia-Snyder was recently interviewed by KCTS9 Arts & Culture series "Dare to be Ugly: Dance That Goes Beyond the Beautiful" highlighting the 8th Annual Seattle International Butoh Festival (SIBF), a two week celebration of butoh dance which ran March 31st– April 9th. Since 2009 Diana has served as Co-Director and performer with DAIPANbutoh, Seattle’s premier Butoh company which produces SIBF.
What is Butoh?
It is an underground performance and mindful movement practice born in Japan after WW2 in the 1950’s. Butoh keeps transforming, evolving and gaining recognition and visibility not just in Seattle but around the world because of its unique thought provoking aesthetics. During a round table discussion/interview with DAIPAN and Ruta de la Memoria, Seattle Post Intelligencer’s Xavier Lopez Jr. reflected, “Butoh has proven itself a vital and innovative global genre”.
This year’s festival was the most ambitious yet with DAIPANbutoh producing a cross cultural exchange hosting 2 international Butoh companies each making their United States debut: Compania Ruta De La Memoria (Chile) took Seattle by storm with “Cuerpo Quebrado” (Broken Body), a piece that masterfully expresses the violence perpetrated on woman during Augusto Pinochet’s regime in the 1970’s and Ken Mai (Japan/Finland) dancing “Requiem For A Flower”
DAIPAN Collective produced the festival in collaboration with Shoreline Community College Theater, the Taoist Studies Institute in Seattle and the UW Dance Department. Festival events included photo and painting exhibit of DAIPANCollective artists from Seattle’s photographer Bruce Tom at the Shoreline Community College Gallery, community based workshops and master classes by all the artists at the Taoist Studies Institute in Seattle and at the UW Dance Department. The festival culminated in main stage performances by Compania Ruta De La Memoria (Chile) and Ken Mai (Japan/Finland) and the DAIPANbutoh Collective including Garcia-Snyder’s newest solo work: Air 1.0 Primal Nature, which was featured on KCTS9.
The 2017 SIBF enjoyed great success due in part to the local and global connections made, the overwhelming response of the audience, and support by local media including: the International Examiner; The Stranger’s "The 44 Best Things To Do In Seattle in April;" and SoySource, a free Japanese newspaper, which published "Close-Up Event: Seattle Butoh Festival." City Arts Magazine will publish a review of the festival in May.
True to the spirit of IAS collaboration, the festival was supported by IAS faculty, staff, and students. IAS Academic Advisor Emily Batlan, a season performer and budding Butoh dancer, served as House Manager for the main stage performances. IAS faculty member Carrie Lanza attended for the second year to witness and lend her support. 50 UW Bothell students had the chance to experience this unique movement practice.
This spring quarter Diana decided to expose UW Bothell students to Butoh and they love it! Look for Diana’s students around the campus as they make their performance offerings to the UW Bothell community on June 1st. Diana Garcia-Snyder can be contacted at dgs3@uw.edu
