Since its founding in 2000, C.I.co. has been actively developing a Contact Improvisation (CI) community within the Japanese dance community, creating and providing a richer dance environment in Japan which includes a cross-fertilization with international artists, leading to Japan’s own form of CI. By conducting workshops with a strong component of international exchange, C.I.co. creates a place to witness, learn and experience this art form, while exploring CI for its potential as a performance art. C.I.co. began "Dance Improvisation Festival Tokyo" from 2002, in it, we invited the artists who participate internationally in the front line, such as D. Lepkoff, R. Chung, N. den Boeft and M. Schumacher. And the collaboration performance with the Japanese artist (dancers, musician and lighting designers) in the main menu, the workshop, meeting and jam, etc. it offered the opportunity which researches the improvisation in total.
In 2001-2003, C.I.co. has received subsidies from the SAISON Foundation.

Dancer / Director

Chico Katsube is a dance improviser, choreographer and a teacher from Osaka, Japan. She received her B.Ed. and M.A. degrees at the Dance Education Division of Ochanomizu University in Tokyo, where she studied Modern Dance and Choreography. From 1990 to 94, she studied and danced in New York City as a company member with many talented choreographers such as Joy Kellman and Ruby Shang. She has also developed her own style of choreography and performance.
She has begun CI activity in Japan with the strong influence and the recommendation of Nancy Stark Smith who visited Japan and taught her workshops in 1997 at the program of “Triangle Project”.
In 2000, she founded C.I.co., a Contact Improvisation Company, with Makiko Ito. Since then she has been a leading figure in teaching, organizing and performing Contact Improvisation in Tokyo and throughout Japan. In 2005, she participated and taught intensive workshop in Contact Festival in Israel. In the summer of 2006, she taught a workshop in the Magpie Collective Workshop and performed with the Magpie Music and Dance in Amsterdam. Now she is creating and studying together improvisation dance with Shoko Kashima, who is a dancer as well as a photographer, to search and mix the Asian Culture in their dance improvisation.

Dancer / Photographer / Co-director

She is a dancer, improviser, photographer and teacher based in Tokyo. She received her Master of Arts in dance education from Ochanomizu University in Tokyo. She went to New York in 2002 to study dance for one year, with a scholarship from the Japanese Government Overseas Study Program for Artists. She founded her own dance company "ZINZOLIN" in 1996, and started Duo unit with Ryoko Sugimoto from 2000. Their piece was selected by Joyce SOHO Presents, DUMBO Festival, The Brooklyn Museum of Art and The Cool NY 2004 Dance Festival in NY. After she came back to Japan, she started to work with Chico Katsube, as a member of C.I.co. and CIFJ. She is also known as a photographer, and have good feeling for taking dance pictures.

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