Performing Saturday Sept. 18:

Roko Kawai

Ms. Kawai's work has been presented throughout Philadelphia and also MRX at the Judson Church and Symphony Space in NYC, Florida Dance Festival, the Chicago Cultural Center, Northwestern University, and at Jacob's Pillow Inside/Out Series. Currently she is working on several of her own projects while dancing for the Leah Stein Dance Company.

Ms. Kawai has been collaborating with musicians since 1990. Her work with David Forlano began in 1994. They have been interested in using music and movement, stillness and silence as equal partners to each other. Their next collaboration, Hakobi, with New Zealander lighting designer Helen Todd, will come to the Painted Bride in December 1999.

More about Roko Kawai:

• from Philadelphia City Paper
• from Philadelphia Weekly

• Footprint/Songline

• TOKORO: Territorial Imperative--A full evening work in nine parts on the nature of place and the boundaries we create, cross, and leave behind. Using riveting sets, video, live and recorded music/sound and fantastic costumes, Ms. Kawai and 5 performers negotiate territory that is geographic, social, and metaphysical.

• HAKOBI/Carriage--An ongoing multi-year exploration of light, movement and sound as equal partners. In collaboration with New Zealand's foremost lighting designer Helen Todd and Pew Fellowship finalist musician/performer David Forlano, Kawai creates new work for each new venue. Inspired originally by the contrast between historical decay in Philadelphia and the young, still seismic geography of New Zealand, HAKOBI uses the bare elements of these three media to evoke people's relationship to their place and time.

  "A work-in-progress exploring perceptual edges and expectations...with these artists the work will grow ...into something beautiful, startling, disturbing and original."
  --Capital Times, Wellington NZ