Born in 1948, he grew up in Kyoto, ancient capital city of around 1700 buddhist temples and more than 1800 sinto shrines. Naturally surrounded by japanese Zen culture, Kan formulates Zen buddhism as a base of his art and approach as a master.

In late 1970s he was a part of crazy famous Kyoto butoh company «BYAKKOSHA».

In 1985 Kan worked with butoh founder Tatsumi HIJIKATA during his last year, when the founder was the most active to convey his knowledge and experience to those who can carry it farther. Kan was there. Kan says he still continues working with one of koans, Hijikata gave to him personally.

At that same period Kan had been exploring Noguchi «gymnastics» learning from the founder Michizo NOGUCHI. It was original «gymnastics» that many butoh masters in 1970s-1980s used as a physical training.

Since 1986 Kan have been studying principles of japanese Noh theatre in one of five traditional Noh schooles — «KONGO» school in Kyoto. In his contemporary art Kan incorporates traditional principles of Noh, which are main principles of stage art in general. So, after avant-garde period of butoh finished, he found the roots of his butoh in tradition with around 700 years of history.

In 1980s-1990s Kan undertook an artistic journey in the countries of Southeast Asia, Africa and South America in order to explore his own dance by observing and working with representatives of local traditional arts. His particular interst was Indonesian performing arts, and for more than 30 years he regularly traveled to study and work with local artists and shamans.

Katsura Kan’s spectacle «Curious Fish» got 5-star rank in Edinborough Fringe festival (2001), that represents the most interesting and fresh performing art productions of each year.

Nowadays Kan continues carrying the Butoh mission around the world, supporting and developing local butoh communitie as a Master, organizing conferences and international butoh festivals, still entering the stage with his inexplicable sharp and subtle dance, and working as a director or choreographer with artists.

In his hometown Kan organises Kyoto International Butoh Festival, each time he tries to gather the most interesting representatives of contemporary, especially non-Japanese, butoh.

As a teacher, director and dancer, Kan gives the audience and his students a completely different depth of understanding of what «butoh», giving an experience of art that can touch you very subtly and delightfully, sometimes in funny and amazing way, but sometimes really stunning. His art-sword can kill you but probably this means the sword of enlightenment will go inside your body and you will never be the same.

Having emerged as part of the Japanese post-war avant-garde of the 1950s and 1960s, today butoh is one of the areas of contemporary dance, well known to the most prominent Western choreographers and theater directors. Or sometimes butoh is categorized somewhere in between theatre, performance and dance. That is because real butoh you can not identify on the stage what it is...

The essence of butoh is far from what you can read on Wikipedia or in other articles written by non-professionals or scientists, but not by butoh masters, such articles emphasize external non-essential features.

What butoh really is you can only understand and perceive directly from the master. Kan is such a master. However, often after communicating with him there are even more questions...

Kan is not ready and does not want to chew and digest the answers for his students. Rather, by giving a new perspective on the issue, he gives you something important for independent research: live with it, then we’ll talk.

His butoh classes and his practices are built in the same way. And his productions, his art.

Kan says, the main thing is observation. And the search for something interesting. But what is «interesting»? And why we keep watching, and how we look and perceive is an essential part of learning art. And the art of butoh, too.

As a matter of principle, Kan does not do butoh classes as a therapeutic work: this is art, which means that we are not working with our personal problems on the stage, but with the perception of the audience.

«風の翼/WINGs of the Wind» is a Butoh Research Seminar with Noh classes.

Katsura Kan: «風の翼/WINGs of the Wind» is a metaphor and indicator for incorporating the technique of «舞/MAI» from Nohgaku into Butoh.
The concept of «舞/MAI» is also seen in the «東北歌舞伎計画/Tohoku Kabuki Project» by Butoh founder Tatsumi Hijikata in his later years, and Katsura Kan positions this as a gift of Asian traditional performing arts that is not found in Western modern dance.

For the past 10 years, Kan have been teaching Butoh class and Noh training (Shimai) in parallel in order to delve into the act of conveying an inexplicable atmosphere as DANCE itself. This is because the technique of conveying the form of the body using «謡/UTAI» as the wind is the shortest cut route to mastering «舞/MAI».

In order to convey this atmosphere (space), it is necessary to feel the «wings» to ride the wind and fly with «Quiet Body» «序破急/JO-HA-KYU» and «残心/ZANSHIN».

Let’s explore the «WINGs of the Wind» together.

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舞/MAI — is a japanese concept of what we can translate as a “dance”. But this means: “to dance is to carry the atmosphere”. 舞/MAI is the art of shite, principal actor in japanese Noh theatre. 舞/MAI is the first hierogyph in 舞踏/“butoh”

«東北歌舞伎計画/Tohoku Kabuki Project» is what Butoh's founder Tatsumi Hijikata called what he did as a researcher, choreographer and director in the last period of his life and work, from the second half of the 1970s to 1986, the year of his death.

«序破急/JO-HA-KYU» is the principle of dynamism, or tempo rhythm. The founder of the Noh Theater in its classical form, as we know it now, Zeami Motokiyo, took the musical principles of tempo rhythm that were used in traditional gagaku music, and having developed them for dance, he began to apply them on the Noh stage.

残心/ZANSHIN — we can explain as "remain with your heart in this, totally". When a samurai deadly cuts or pierces his opponent in a duel situation, he does not immediately sheathe his sword and leaves: after the climax, he takes a pause so that what happened is imprinted on his heart, it really happened in perception. The zanshin principle is used in traditional martial arts, such as karate and iaido. Also in kyudo, the traditional art of archery. And in the dance of the theater Noh.

The concepts mentioned by Kan are Zen principles that are incorporated into the theory and practice of various Japanese traditional arts.

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P. S. During the residency, Kan plans to give several lectures for the participants on the topic of connection between Butoh and Noh, revealing Zen principles and concepts in the traditional arts of Japan.