Eiko Otake in Residence

Pillow Fort Arts Center is excited to host interdisciplinary performance artist Eiko Otake for a residency from September 14th - September 17, 2025 as part of an upstate New York tour. This tour will introduce Otake to multiple new communities in upstate New York, including in the Hudson Valley and the western Catskills.

As part of her residency, Otake will present a series of public programs. On Sunday, September 14th, Otake will offer a three-hour Delicious Movement Workshop hosted at Pillow Fort Arts Center, where participants can experience Otake’s embodied practice and engage with her as a teacher. On Tuesday, September 16th, Otake will screen her recent film work, No Rule Is Our Rule, followed by an intimate discussion about her creative process and the themes explored in her work, co-hosted by Bushel Collective in Delhi, NY. Finally, on Wednesday, September 17th, Otake will present a small performance at Woodland Cemetery in Delhi, NY, offering an opportunity to witness her powerful and evocative movement language in an accessible outdoor setting. The diverse events offer the local community a unique opportunity to engage with Otake in multiple ways—experiencing her as a performer, engaging in dialogue during an artist talk, and interacting with her in more intimate, participatory settings like workshops, allowing for a deeper understanding of her multifaceted practice.

Born and raised in Japan and a resident of New York since 1976, Eiko Otake is a movement-based, interdisciplinary artist. She worked for more than 40 years as Eiko & Koma performing their own choreography which earned them Guggenheim, MacArthur, and United States Artists Fellowships, as well as the Samuel H. Scripps American Dance Festival and the Dance Magazine Awards.

Since 2014, Eiko has been directing her own projects. She has performed a series of site-specific solo work, A Body in Places at over 76 sites. In 2016, Eiko was the subject of the 10th annual Danspace Platform, a month-long curated program that brought her a Special Bessies Citation, an Art Matters Grant, and the Anonymous Was a Woman Award. A Body in Fukushima records Eiko‘s solo performances in post-nuclear disaster Fukushima, Japan. The project has produced a book publication, a feature-length film as well as numerous photo exhibitions, lectures, and performances. In 2017, Eiko launched her multi-year Duet Project, a mutable and evolving series of experiments in collaborations. She has worked with artists David Harrington, Ishmael Houston-Jones, Wen Hui, Joan Jonas, DonChristian Jones, Iris McCloughan, Beverly McIver, Mérian Soto, Wen Hui, and her late grandfather, Chikuha Otake. Her 10-year project, I Invited Myself, is a series of exhibitions and screenings of her media works. Her short and feature-length films have been screened in many film festivals internationally. www.eikootake.org