Beijing Modern Dance Company

The Beijing Modern Dance Company (BMDC) is a leading professional modern dance company in China. The Company regularly performs throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, North and South America, and at art festivals such as the Berlin Art Festival, la Biennale di Venezia, the International Performance Festival in Bologna, Italy, the Bahia Festival in Brazil, the Singapore Arts Festival, Korea’s Chang Mu International Dance Festival, the Tokyo International Theatre Festival, the Biennale de Lyon, the Europalia Festival, Sibiu International Drama Festival, the Canada Dance Festival, and the John F. Kennedy Center Festival of China in Washington DC, etc. BMDC has received national and international acclaim from audiences, critics and experts alike for its diverse repertoire, one that integrates the traditional culture of China with influences from abroad.

Gao Yanjinzi

Art director of Beijing Modern Dance Company (BMDC)

Gao Yanjinzi is one of the founding members of Beijing Modern Dance Company. Her work draws on her Buddhist upbringing and traditional Chinese dance training. In a contemplative, harmonious world, her dancers move with a natural flow of energy, yet surprises lurk around every turn, causing audiences to question the legitimacy of such binaries as “traditional/modern”and “East/West”.

She has received numerous major awards for performance and choreography both in China and abroad, including the Grand Prix at the 12th International Modern Choreography Competi-tion in Belarus for her piece Worlds(1999).Ms. Gao has adjudicated national dance competi-tions and served as artistic director for such programs as the 2006 China Central Television (CCTv) Chinese Lunar New Year Arts Special. She performs and presents her work throughout Asia, Europe, Australia, North and South America, and has received commissions to create works for such festivals as the Berlin Art Festival (Jue-Aware,2004), Italy’s Biennale de Venezia (Oath-Midnight Rain, 2006), Singapore Dance Festival Jing Hua Shui Yue-INTO, 2006), Holland’s International Dance Festival(Women of the World-Offering,2007), etc. Her work Jue-Aware has received the Danza e Danza award for best performance in 2006 by Italy’s leading dance magazine Danzae Danza. Ms.Gao has been personally invited by Pina Bausch to create and perform a solo work “AsI heard”to premiere in Ms. Pina Bausch’s dance festival in Germany in November,2008. Ms. Gao collaborated with Wen Wei Dance of Canada in 2009 to work on a new work Under the Skin which has successfully premiered at Canada Dance Festival at the Canada National Art Center in 2010 and toured around Canada in 201l. Her latest work Offering-Fragrance in 2011 has just successfully premiered in May at the National Centre for Performing Arts. As an artist who always practices what she preaches and who’s always dedicated to her craft and is continuously pushing the boundary, Gao Yanjnzi is frequently invited by the Education Centre of the National Centre for Performing Arts to give workshops and seminars to share with an increasing number of dance lovers and art lovers what dancehas given her in retum over the years of her creative work.