Yayoi Kambara started her career as a professional dancer and currently directs and produces multi-media performance works, including film and XR. Kambara was recognized by Opera America as a female stage director and received an Isadora Duncan Dance Award in Outstanding Achievement as a co-interrogator of Dancing Around Race. kambaraplus.org / dancingaroundrace.com

Kambara was a company member with ODC/Dance from 2003–2015. After she retired from full-time dance performance, she completed the 4th APAP Leadership Fellows Program Cohort and led a year-long Community Engagement Residency for Bridge Live Arts. "Aesthetic Shift" was an exchange dedicated to interrogating and analyzing the overlap between equity values, creative practices, and organizations. This research inspires her to lead her creative practices as social practice.

Her dance project IKKAI means once: a transplanted pilgrimage, commissioned by the San Jose Japanese American Citizens League and awarded a William and Flora Hewlett Foundation Hewlett 50 award, premiered in 2023. IKKAI shares the experiences of those illegally incarcerated during World War II and dares to dream of a collective future where this kind of injustice will never happen again.

She produced 二度と(NI DO TO): an XR pilgrimage, sharing the choreographic research for IKKAI and celebrating the resilience of Japanese Americans. Audiences learn obon dance by Nobuko Miyamoto as an interactive hologram, view a 360 film created at Manzanar, hear poetry from a Janice Mirikitani Zoltar-type machine, and reflect on current/future solidarities with communities facing xenophobic policies. 二度と was co-commissioned by Georgia Tech Arts and will be shared at the San Jose Japanese American Museum April 18-June 29, 2025.

We are thrilled to offer the opportunity of this mentorship to our Winter 2025 Residents. Yayoi's love of dance and excitement to work with artists as a movement dramaturg and sounding board in the creative practice is invaluable to any performing artist in developing work.