A life fantasy born from a very personal story

Ikuyo Kuroda received wide acclaim upon the recreation and presentation of her representative work "Flowers flow, time congeals" at the Festival/Tokyo 09 Autumn. Pushing herself and her dancers to an extreme limit, Kuroda's many fans admire her dynamic choreography that, similarly to the primordial nature of dance, has the ability to exceed the borders of time and the self. Kuroda's methods of creation were recorded in a documentary and text upon the presentation of "Yajirushi to kusari" (arrows and chains) at the Dance Triennial Tokyo 2009.The real life experiences of the five performers forms the core of the work, including video elements and dialogue. Put together these personal experiences in turn gave way to a larger world-view.

Commissioned by F/T, in "Ray of light, shards of mirror" Kuroda explores new territory by employing documentary methods, finally exceeding the documentary genre leaping into a universe of fantasy. In this work thematizing "mother", Kuroda asked every one of the performers questions about "meeting with your mother". Every performer was then asked to reply in the shape of a physical expression. Kuroda gathered the seeds that were sown in this process of creation, constructing one work out of the answers of nine different people. This unique work featuring male performers in addition to female dancers, is expected to develop a new dramaturgy of dance in its search of "being a mother".