Eiko & Koma

Eiko Otake
Born in 1952 in Tokyo, Japan

Koma Otake
Born 1948 in Niigata, Japan

For an overview of the Eiko & Koma Collection and its subcollections, please visit the Eiko & Koma Collection Guide.

Eiko (female) and Koma (male) were law and political science students in Japan when, in 1971, they each joined the Tatsumi Hijikata company in Tokyo. Their initially experimental collaboration soon developed into an exclusive partnership. The following year, Eiko and Koma started working as independent artists in Tokyo. At the same time, they began to study with Kazuo Ohno, who along with Hijikata was the central figure in the Japanese avant-garde theatrical movement of the 1960s. Neither Eiko nor Koma have studied traditional Japanese dance or theater forms; they have preferred to choreograph and perform only their own works.

Their interest in Neue Tanz, the German modern dance movement which flourished alongside the Bauhaus movement in art and architecture, and their desire to explore nonverbal theater took them to Hanover, Germany in 1972. There they studied with Manja Chmiel, a disciple of Mary Wigman, the noted pioneer of Expressionism in dance. In 1973, they moved to Amsterdam and for the next two years toured extensively in Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Tunisia.

Their first American performance, White Dance, was sponsored by the Japan Society in May of 1976. Since then, they have presented their works at theaters, universities, museums, galleries and festivals world-wide, including numerous appearances at the American Dance Festival and five seasons at BAM's Next Wave Festival. Eiko & Koma are known for presenting outdoor works as free events in public sites. By performing at dozens of sites for over 30,000 audience members, Eiko & Koma have shared their work with a more diverse public than is usually attainable in theaters. They wish to present their dance as a part of the landscape, an offering and a process rather than a product.

Eiko & Koma were named John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellows for 1984. They were awarded one of the first "Bessies" (the New York Dance and Performance Awards) in 1984 for Grain and Night Tide, and were honored again in 1990 for Passage. They were named MacArthur Fellows in June of 1996. This was the first time in the program’s history that the foundation awarded a so-called "genius" fellowship to be shared by collaborators. In 2004, they received the Samuel H. Scripps American Dance Festival Award for “lifetime contributions to the field of modern dance.” They received the 2006 Dance Magazine Award and were awarded one of the first fifty United States Artists fellowships. In 2007 and again in 2009, Eiko & Koma were awarded an ALASKA AIR Fellowship administrated by United States Artists with support from the Rasmuson Foundation. In 2012 Eiko & Koma were named to the first round of artists selected for the Doris Duke Performing Arts Awards (2012). Notably, they were each honored as individual artists.

Eiko & Koma have been permanent residents of the United States since 1976. Eiko now performs as a soloist and directs her own projects in collaboration with other artists.