Jennifer Aoki

Jennifer is a fourth-generation Japanese Canadian dancemaker/performer and educator who lives and works on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish Peoples. Her formative dance training began at Simon Fraser University 2006 – 2010. After obtaining a BFA in Dance from SFU, she studied Contact Improvisation on scholarship at EDAM Dance and she co-founded Triadic Dance Works collective. Jennifer is currently co-Artistic Director of The Body Orchestra, a collective with the mandate to create highly physical, accessible work to original music, and she is also a Body Orchestra dancer, choreographer, and co-producer. In her choreographic practice, she draws inspiration from the news industry, social media, childhood memories, nature, environmental issues, and most recently Japanese Canadian history. Jennifer is interested in cultivating a choreographic language that extends beyond the form of dance, experimenting with intersections between lighting, music, and embodied performance. She strives to take part in the creative process by investigating how she can be both physically and psychologically involved in the work. Jennifer acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, New Westminster Small Neighbourhood Grants, and Made in BC- Dance on Tour, as well as residencies and partnerships with The Dance Centre, The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, SFU’s School for the Contemporary Arts, and Marc’s Madness. As a dancer, she has been fortunate to collaborate with and perform in works by Meredith Kalaman, Machinenoisy, Jenn Edwards (Toronto), Tomoyo Yamada, Body Narratives Collective, Jamee Valin(Toronto), Patricia Alison (Toronto), Jacinte Armstrong (Halifax), Barbara Lindenberg (Toronto), Anna Kraulis and Gemma Crowe. Interdisciplinary collaborators include sound designer Jakob Liljenwall, creative editor Gemma Crowe, musician/songwriter Zane Barrett, and lighting designer Jonathan Kim.

Photo Credit : Chris Randle