Lisa Densem (born 1965) is a New Zealand choreographer.

Biography

Densem grew up in

Christchurch, New Zealand Christchurch (; ) is the largest city in the South Island and the second-largest city by urban area population in New Zealand. Christchurch has an urban population of , and a metropolitan population of over half a million. It is located in ...

. Her father, John Densem, was a composer and musician. She trained at

New Zealand School of Dance The New Zealand School of Dance was established in 1967 and is a tertiary educational institute in New Zealand that teaches Contemporary dance, contemporary dance and ballet. It started as the National School of Ballet, and after contemporary da ...

in 1985 and 1986. In 1998 she received a

Creative New Zealand The Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa (Creative New Zealand) is the national arts development agency of the New Zealand government established in 1963. It invests in artists and arts organisations, offering capability building programmes a ...

scholarship to study in New York and in 1999 she moved to

Berlin, Germany Berlin ( ; ) is the capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the highest population within its city limits of any city in the European Union. The city is also one of the states of ...

, to work with the German dance company Sasha Waltz & Guests run by

Sasha Waltz Sasha Alexandra Waltz (born 8 March 1963, Karlsruhe) is a German choreographer, dancer and leader of the dance company Sasha Waltz and Guests. Biography Waltz is the daughter of an architect and a curator. At the age of five years she had her ...

. She remained with the company until 2004, when she became a freelance performer and choreographer. In 2013 Densem returned to New Zealand to create a new dance work for

Footnote Dance Footnote New Zealand Dance (founded in 1985) is New Zealand's oldest contemporary dance company. Based in Wellington, it has been described as "New Zealand’s most enduring and influential contemporary dance company." History Footnote was found ...

; she also created ''No Such Place'' for Footnote in 2005. Densem collaborated in 2021 with Miriam Jakob and Jana Unmüßig who are on scholarship with Berlin Artistic Research on the performance ''Meandering nearby Breathing.''

Filmography

References

New Zealand choreographers New Zealand School of Dance alumni Living people 1965 births People from Christchurch {{dance-bio-stub