TOTEM: Void & Height | Sankai Juku
Date: Thu, Nov 12, 2026
Time: 7:00 PM - 8:30 PM
Venue: Memorial Hall, Chapel Hill
Price: $11 Students | $39 - $99
Category: Community
“A repertoire of work that is graceful and visually stunning, immersing audiences in its hypnotic light.” – The Straits Times Sankai Juku creates work that unfolds slowly and deliberately, into what can feel like a new world, where forces like time and gravity seem to act on us in radically new ways. In TOTEM: Void and Height, dancers move with extraordinary presence and precision. Practicing the Japanese dance tradition of Butoh, the company’s performances exist somehow between stillness and action, between gravity and transcendence—and sometimes feel less like watching dance and more like stepping inside a waking dream. The final work choreographed by their founder Ushio Amagatsu before his death in 2024, TOTEM: Void and Height reflects a lifelong exploration of the relationship between the human body, the natural world, and the forces that shape them both. Through striking imagery and breathtaking physical control, the performance invites audiences to slow down, pay attention, and experience time differently. This is a rare opportunity to encounter one of the world’s most influential contemporary dance companies and the final artistic vision of the artist who shaped it for more than five decades.
