Ariadone

• 1981
• France

Through her work with Ariadone, Carlotta Ikeda continues to seek out new paths for her life and her dancing. Since moving to France, she has sometimes tended to forget that she is originally Japanese. This constant disconnect between her life and her origins has fundamentally shaped her approach to dance, characterised by total freedom of choice throughout her career. For Carlotta, the purpose of life is to pursue the state of absolute purity and veracity inherent to nothingness. To represent nothing, to become nothing, is to open up the possibility of becoming anything and everything. Life is preparation for death: a quest to be no more, learning how to dissolve into nothingness, aspiring to that wilted beauty which precedes oblivion. This philosophical quest is one of the pillars of Carlotta Ikeda’s style, which eschews form and technique in the pursuit of self-effacement. The spirit defers to the body, in the pursuit of self-transcendence.

Carlotta Ikeda passed away in December 2014.