Anzu Furukawa(å¤å·ÂãÂÂãÂÂãÂÂ, February 28 , 1952 â October 23 , 2001) was a butoh dancer and performance artist. Since 1973 she has worked as a choreographer, performer and dancer in various groups in Japan including Dairakudakan and Europe.
Anzu Furukawa began her dance career at the age of ten.àShe studied classical ballet withàUmeko Inoueàat the Tokyo Ballet School between 1962 and 1970 and modern dance withàZenkà  Hinoàbetween 1969 and 1970 .àAt the end of the 1960s, the spirit of optimism in the student movement also reached high school and high school students in Tokyo.
The peace movement, anti-American protests and a burgeoning rebellion against the restrictive establishment united young people in the Japanese metropolises.àIn the late 1960s, Furukawa wasàforcibly expelled from Tokyo Metropolitan Tachikawa High School along with a group of other classmates for their participation in student riots.àHowever, she managed a short time lateràto get a place at the Music Conservatory ofàToho Gakuen School of Music.àFrom 1972 to 1975 she studied composition and piano underàIrino Yoshirà Âàand increasingly turned to avant-garde art andàperformance-scene too.
The second developmental movement of Japanese butoh, seamlessly following the works of founding fathersàTatsumi HijikataàandàKazuo Ono, took place amidst the social upheavals of 1970s Japan, in an atmosphere marked byàstudent riots, street fighting and barricades,àperformanceàacts andàagitpropà.àIn 1974, Furukawa joined the legendary butoh companyàDairakudakanàunderàAkaji Maroàand stayed there until 1979, together withàTetsuro Tamura founded the avant-garde DanceLoveMachine (1979âÂÂ86) ensemble.àShe was considered to be artistically versatile and was well-versed in both classical and modern dance. Her dance work included collaborations with Carlotta Ikeda, Murobishi Ko and Sankai Juku.
In 1986 she visited with the DanceLoveMachine Ensemble at the invitation of theàKünstlerhaus BethanienàBerlinàand started a European tour from there.àThe dance company Dance Butter Tokyo, founded in Tokyo, the majority of whose members were recruited from their dance school DANCE ANZU SCHOOL, got a German branchàDance Butter Freiburgàin Freiburg. In 1995 she appeared inàHisaya Iwasa'sàauthor's filmà"Petite Hanako: the actress who captured Rodin's heart" in the role of the danceràà Âta Hanako, the film celebrated in the same year at the film festival in Montreux (àInternational Electronic Cinema Festival, Tokyo/Montreux) premiered and won the Best Documentary Award.
She died in 2001 at the age of 49 from complications from cancer.
Her life's work includes more than 50 dance and stage works, many of which were created in the 1980s and realized in Europe, including works such asÃÂ Anzu's Animal Atlas, Cells of Apple, Faust II, Rent-a-bodyÃÂ and also:
She received grants and prizes, e.g.àfrom the Goethe Institute Tokyo, The Japan Foundation, Japan Arts Council (æ¥揸è¡ÂæÂÂÃ¥ÂÂæ¯èÂÂä¼Â), theàAlfred Kordelin Foundation, The Art Council of province of Central Finland (Keski-Suomen taidetoimikunta), the Astro-Labium Prize, The International Electronic Cinema Festival in Montreux and the Cologne Theater Prize.
In 1991 she accepted the call to Braunschweig University of Art, where she took on a professorship for performance and performing arts in the performing arts department (now the Institute for Performing Arts and Education).ÃÂ She taught dance there until 1996, directedÃÂ happeningsÃÂ and created choreographies, e.g.ÃÂ with their performance project Verwandlungsamt.ÃÂ From the mid-1990s she worked on productions in Scandinavia, especially in Finland.ÃÂ She was considered a driving force in the development of the Finnish butoh scene and her work influenced generations of dancers.ÃÂ As a guest lecturer she taught at several Finnish universities and created joint productions at Finnish National Theatre, she has directed works such as theÃÂ Rite of SpringÃÂ (1994) andÃÂ BoÃÂ andÃÂ Shiroi mizuÃÂ (1995) with mostly Finnish ensemble members. Her best-known students includeÃÂ Minako Seki, Yuko Kaseki, Takako Suzuki, Yuko Negoro, Kim Itoh.