Iván-Daniel Espinosa
- PhD Student
- THEATRE
Spring 2025 Office Hours: Tuesday 2:30-4:30pm * must make appointment *
Iván-Daniel Espinosa is a PhD Candidate in Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder. He also holds a Master of Arts in Performance Studies from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.
As a dance choreographer and performance studies scholar, Iván-Daniel writes about and creates work engaged with mycology and fungi, Japanese Butoh dance, climate change and interspecies performance. His recent multimedia dance installations involving mycelium fungi networks, bioacoustics and myco-sonification are highlighted in a chapter-length discussion of his work titled “Mycelium in Motion: Choreographing Care in Iván-Daniel Espinosa’s Messengers Divinos” that was published in a 2024 Routledge monograph titled Choreographing Dirt: Movement, Performance, and Ecology in the Anthropocene. Since 2015, Iván-Daniel has presented his ecology-themed and mycology-themed performances nationwide at renowned venues such as La Mama Experimental Theatre in NYC, the historic Judson Memorial Church, Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art (BMoCA), Seattle International Butoh Festival, Salish Sea Butoh Festival, Seattle Arts in Nature Festival, Houston Fringe Festival, and at numerous academic conferences.
Iván-Daniel’s PhD dissertation research examines interspecies relationships between human beings and mycelium fungi through the lenses of choreography and performance. This interdisciplinary research highlights how ‘fungal choreographies’ create ecological and cultural meaning in diverse human and non-human environments, including in the context of interspecies performances that engage with fungi.
Iván-Daniel's approaches to performance and choreography are highly influenced by his extensive studies of Japanese Butoh (舞踏, Butō), a contemporary form of dance-theatre that originated in the avant-garde scene of 1960’s Tokyo. For over a decade, Iván-Daniel has studied and trained with renowned Butoh artists and master teachers from Japan including Natsu Nakajima, Saga Kobayashi, Hiroko & Koichi Tamano, and with Dai Matsuoka of the world-renowned Japanese Butoh dance troupe SANKAI JUKU. Iván-Daniel began his formative Butoh training in Seattle with Northwest Butoh pioneer Dr. Joan Laage, who continues to serve as his artistic mentor and collaborator to this day. Iván-Daniel is the Founder and Executive Producer of the SALISH SEA BUTOH FESTIVAL, an annual artistic convergence on the Olympic Peninsula that brings together hundreds of artists from around the world to deepen the study Butoh.
Recent Courses Taught
Spring 2025 THTR 1009: Theatre and Society
Fall 2024 THTR 1009: Theatre and Society
Fall 2024 THTR 1003: Acting 1
Spring 2024 DNCE 1027: Dance in Culture
Spring 2024 THTR 1009: Theatre and Society
Academic Conference Presentations and Invitations
- Butoh Scores Symposium at Yale University’s MacMillan Center for International Studies — Nov. 2024
- American Society for Theatre Research (ASTR) — Nov. 2024
- Center for Monster Studies Conference at University of California-Santa Cruz — Oct. 2024
- Mid-America Theatre Conference at University of Wisconsin-Madison — March 2024
- College Art Association (CAA) National Conference — Feb. 2024
- Southern Humanities Conference — Jan. 2024
- Mid-America Theatre Conference in Minneapolis — March 2023
- Southern Humanities Conference — Jan. 2023
- Imagining Differently: Research-Creation Symposium at York University (Toronto, Canada) — 2021
- BUTOH NEXT Symposium at C.U.N.Y. Graduate Center in New York — 2019
Honors and Awards
- Nature, Environment, Science & Technology (NEST) Studio for the Arts Fellowship 2024
- City of Boulder Arts Commission Leadership Pipeline Fund Scholarship Award 2024
- CU Department of Women and Gender Studies Karen Raforth Scholarship in LGBTQ Studies 2024
- Kathryn M. Reynolds Award for Best Academic Paper at the Southern Humanities Conference 2024
- Finalist for Princeton Arts Fellowship at Princeton University’s Lewis Center for the Arts 2023
- Engaged Arts and Humanities Scholars Award, CU Office for Outreach and Engagement 2023
- ATLAS Institute B2 Center for Media, Arts & Performance Graduate Fellowship
- Devaney Doctoral Fellowship, University of Colorado-Boulder College of Arts and Sciences 2022
Iván-Daniel's approaches to performance and choreography are highly influenced and inspired by his extensive studies of Japanese Butoh. Iván-Daniel has studied and trained with veteran Butoh artists Hiroko & Koichi Tamano, Natsu Nakajima, Katsura Kan, Keiji Semimaru Morita and Dai Matsuoka of the world-renowned Butoh dance troupe SANKAI JUKU, and Diego Piñón. Iván-Daniel began his formative Butoh training in Seattle with Sheri Brown and Pacific Northwest Butoh pioneer Joan Laage, both of whom continue to serve as artistic mentors and collaborators to this day. Iván-Daniel holds a Master of Arts degree in Performance Studies from Tisch School of the Arts at New York University (NYU). He is currently a PhD student in Theatre and Performance Studies at CU Boulder.