About

There, she studied the styles of Martha Graham, Trisha Brown, and Merce Cunningham and participated in various choreographic projects.

Her experience of the 9/11 attacks in New York led her to participate for two years (2004–2006) in the development of the Mahdia and Monastir Dance Conservatories (Tunisia).

In 2007, upon returning to Japan, she presented her first solo performance, Daichi, at the Dance Hakushu festival organized by Min Tanaka, where she was invited back the following year to continue her choreographic exploration.
Between 2009 and 2011, she was engaged by the AToU company (France) and developed projects in Nicaragua, Italy, and Poland through artist residencies and festivals.

In 2012, she choreographed Love, Madness and Mysticism to the music of John Zorn (whom she met during her time in New York) as well as a dance/music improvisation project with another international musician, Keiji Haino. This latest performance marks the start of a five-year artist-in-residence program for Cie AToU in Vaulx-en-Velin, France. This period saw the creation of several works in collaboration with various artistic disciplines: WelCOME (architecture), SHiNMu (digital arts), Mille Oasis (set design), and Love Me Softly / Kill Me Tender (DJ, text, and architecture).

During this period, Anan Atoyama also explored co-creation with a group of 380 people, bringing together differences in age, culture, physicality, personality, and gender. Among her experimental projects are the Défilé at the 2016 Lyon Dance Biennale and TransForme (2013–2017), in which participants are involved in every aspect of the creations.

In 2017, she collaborated once again with Keiji Haino on a piece inspired by Carolyn Carlson, in homage to Kazuo Ohno: Hidden Body, which premiered at Fabrica Europa (Italy).

In 2019, she launched a series of works blending art and science with Limpid Sun, a piece created in collaboration with biologist Pierre-Henri Gouyon of the National Museum of Natural History, presented at the Setouchi Triennale International Contemporary Art Festival (Japan), followed by the Dynamic Origin project, invited by Srinivas Lab (Oxford University’s Embryology Laboratory) from 2020 to 2021. 

In 2022, she began a research project on migration issues that led to the creation of the performance Island without Sea. Inspired by refugees’ stories and the Geneva Convention, this performance applies the principles of her real-time co-creation method, known as Création Directe. Four hundred people participated in the performance during the Contre-Sens Festival (September 2024).

In February 2026, she presents her new Création Directe, Atlas des Souffles, in Paris, whose scientific and sociological theme is the rise of sea levels and its impact on the populations of these territories.