In this solo entitled “Miroku”, created with his artistic partner Kei Miyata, Saburo Teshigawara bathes in blue. The luminous scenography of this work creates an environment where the body is in total harmony yet simultaneously under powerful tension. The movement of life, from birth to death, imagined under a shower of white confetti, develops smoothly yet with a staccato rhythm. The incredible precision of the dancer's gestures, the quality of his presence on stage help plot the purpose of his dance, like a happy ending, where the soul is released from the being and floats in blissful nothingness. The spiritual in art.

Source : Press book Maison de la Danse season 2008-2009

Saburo Teshigawara began his unique creative career in 1981 in his native Tokyo after studying plastic arts and classic ballet. In 1985, he formed KARAS with Kei Miyata and started group choreography and their own activities. Since then, he and KARAS have been invited every year to perform in major international cities around the world. In addition to solo performances and his work with KARAS, Teshigawara has also been receiving international attention as a choreographer/director.He has been commissioned by many international Ballet companies such as the Paris Opera to create repertoire pieces for the company. Teshigawara has likewise received increasing international attention in the visual arts field, with art exhibitions, films / videos as well as designing scenography, lighting and costume for all his performances. Teshigawara's keenly honed sculptural sensibilities and powerful sense of composition, command of space and his decisive dance movements all fuse to create a unique world that is his alone. Keen interests in music and space have led him to create site-specific works, and collaboration with various types of musicians.

Besides the continuous workshops at the KARAS studio in Tokyo, Saburo Teshigawara has been involved in many education projects. Recent young members of the company KARAS are from the project "Dance of Air", an educational project bringing out a performance as a culmination of a year-long workshop process, produced by the New national Theatre Tokyo. S.T.E.P. (Saburo Teshigawara Education Project) has been initiated since 1995 with partners in the UK, also in the same style as "Dance of Air". In 2004, he was selected as the mentor of dance for The Rolex Mentor and Protege Arts Initiative, to work for one year with a chosen protégé. He is a professor from 2014 at Tama Art university, department of Scenography Design, Drama, and Dance. 2006-2013, he taught at the College of Contemporary Psychology,St. Paul’s(Rikkyo) University in Japan. Through these various projects, Saburo Teshigawara continues to encourage and inspire young dancers, together with his creative work.

Source : The company Karas 's website

More information : st-karas.com

Author, filmmaker and video artist Charles Picq (1952-2012) entered working life in the 70s through theatre and photography. A- fter resuming his studies (Maîtrise de Linguistique - Lyon ii, Maîtrise des sciences et Techniques de la Communication - grenoble iii), he then focused on video, first in the field of fine arts at the espace Lyonnais d'art Contemporain (ELAC) and with the group « Frigo », and then in dance.
   On creation of the Maison de la Danse in Lyon in 1980, he was asked to undertake a video documentation project that he has continued ever since. During the ‘80s, a decade marked in France by the explosion of contemporary dance and the development of video, he met numerous artists such as andy Degroat, Dominique Bagouet, Carolyn Carlson, régine Chopinot, susanne Linke, Joëlle Bouvier and regis Obadia, Michel Kelemenis. He worked in the creative field with installations and on-stage video, as well as in television with recorded shows, entertainment and documentaries.

His work with Dominique Bagouet (80-90) was a unique encounter. He documents his creativity, assisting with Le Crawl de Lucien and co-directing with his films Tant Mieux, Tant Mieux and 10 anges. in the 90s he became director of video development for the Maison de la Danse and worked, with the support of guy Darmet and his team, in the growing space of theatre video through several initiatives:
       - He founded a video library of dance films with free public access. This was a first for France. Continuing the video documentation of theatre performances, he organised their management and storage.
       - He promoted the creation of a video-bar and projection room, both dedicated to welcoming school pupils.
       - He started «présentations de saisons» in pictures.
       - He oversaw the DVD publication of Le tour du monde en 80 danses, a pocket video library produced by the Maison de la Danse for the educational sector.

       - He launched the series “scènes d'écran” for television and online. He undertook the video library's digital conversion and created Numeridanse.

His main documentaries are: enchaînement, Planète Bagouet, Montpellier le saut de l'ange, Carolyn Carlson, a woman of many faces, grand ecart, Mama africa, C'est pas facile, Lyon, le pas de deux d'une ville, Le Défilé, Un rêve de cirque.

He has also produced theatre films: Song, Vu d'ici (Carolyn Carlson), Tant Mieux, Tant Mieux, 10 anges, Necesito and So schnell, (Dominique Bagouet), Im bade wannen, Flut and Wandelung (Susanne Linke), Le Cabaret Latin (Karine Saporta), La danse du temps (Régine Chopinot), Nuit Blanche (Abou Lagraa), Le Témoin (Claude Brumachon), Corps est graphique (Käfig), Seule et WMD (Françoise et Dominique Dupuy), La Veillée des abysses (James Thiérrée), Agwa (Mourad Merzouki), Fuenteovejuna (Antonio Gades), Blue Lady revistied (Carolyn Carlson).

Source: Maison de la Danse de Lyon