Shakti is Sanskrit for "energy";
creative energy and sexual energy.
All Shakti's dance is centered towards the activation of this energy.
The two opposite forces of life and death, creation and destruction,
chaos and serenity,
plus and minus
are played upon in a neverending game.
Shakti is a lover of nature.
She spends her time in the wild outback
of Australia with her husband, Jorg,
where she gets her energy
and her inspiration to create and to live.
She is a creature of the wild
and it is evident in her dance.
No borders.
No boundaries.
Only passion and ecstasy.
Shakti was born in 1957 in Kyoto, Japan to an Indian father and a Japanese mother.
Her mother founded the VasantaMala Indian Dance Institute and was the first Japanese woman
to introduce Indian dance into Japan. Her father was a professor of English at the Kyoto University of Foreign Studies and the founder and director of the Gandhi Institute in Kyoto.
SHAKTI ｇrew up with not only the rich cultural heritage of Japan but of India as well.
She studied yoga with her father and dance with her mother and with the foremost gurus of India.
While earning an M.A. in Indian Philosophy at Columbia University in New York City, SHAKTI studied modern dance with Martha Graham, Alvin Ailey and jazz dance with Luigi.
Upon returning to Japan, SHAKTI developed a unique hybrid form of dance blending an array of Eastern dance traditions and yoga with Western jazz and contemporary rock resulting in an exotic, erotic, and shocking effect. She has been performing worldwide to great critical acclaim.
Her unique and mesmerising performances have touched and tantalised audiences everywhere.
She is called the "Dancing Phoenix" and the "Sculpture in Movement."
She is the coordinator of the Japan Experience which assists and manages Japanese artists abroad.
The Scotsman said "The greatest step for Asian Art in Edinburgh!"
SHAKTI is also the artistic director of The Garage International which is now one of the most prominent venues in various festivals such as Avignon and Adelaide Fringe. Shakti is also the founder and artistic director of the Tokyo Fringe Festival.
There are no borders no boundaries for this universal artist.