Tiia Kasurinen (she/her) is an artist/choreographer graduated from Stockholm University of the Arts in 2017. She is interested in themes such as identity, gender, the gaze and pop culture, and explores them in her works through visual transformation and motion. In her works YouTube tutorials and somatic movement walk hand in hand, creating recognisable aesthetics.
Kasurinen’s work has been presented f.ex. in Helsinki Festival and Zodiak – Centre for New Dance, New Performance Turku Biennale, Nordic House of Faroe Islands, Reykjavik Art Festival/Gátt Hub and Kuopio City Theatre/Dance Theatre Minimi. When not working on her own projects, Tiia Kasurinen works as a dancer and a performer and collaborates with other artists. She recently worked on a nordic installation performance JÖRÐ, premiered in the Nordic House of Faroe Islands. Kasurinen is a member of Precarious Practices – a group of dance artists, whose activities are based on artistic exchange. She has been invited to join the Nordic Platform Gátt network of young artists.
In 2022, Kasurinen was awarded an international DanceWEB scholarship to the ImpulsTanz Festival in Vienna. Her newest work COURTSHIP DISPLAY (BIRDS OF PARADISE) was selected to the finale of Danse Élargie, a choreography competition co-devised by Boris Charmatz and Emmanuel Demarcy Mota. Kasurinen works with a one-year grant from the Finnish Cultural Foundation 2023-2024. She was granted the state artist grant for 2021.
Productions
ONSTAGE – The Concert (2023)
ONSTAGE – The Concertexplores alter ego bodies and stage presences in the context of live music. What emerges when contemporary choreography and visual transformation meet the practices of making and performing music?
The work will be based on the electronic pop-band formed by Tiia Kasurinen (concept, choreography, performance) and Olli Lautiola (sound design) and an EP-record of the band, which Kasurinen and Lautiola will composed and wrote during years 2021-2023. The protagonist of the performance is an alter ego -body practiced by Kasurinen. The stage will be also joined by a voguing performance art duo Amanda & Lydia (Lydia Ofi Teresia and Amanda 007). The performance is an album release party, a dance piece, a musical try-out and a choreographic alter ego-exploration. What does the combination of a gig and a choreographic work evoke - in the performers and in the audience?
ONSTAGE – The Concert got its premiere at Dance House Helsinki in the end of August 2023 as part of Helsinki Festival's programme. The piece was seen on Zodiak stage in September 2023.
Contact: Katarina Lindholm (Zodiak – Center for New Dance), katarina.lindholm@zodiak.fi
"Kasurinen is a collection of different gestures, movements and attitudes. But where such an expression usually leads to plasticity and soullessness, the opposite happens in the work. Ah - enjoyment, laughing at one's own pleasure and becoming sensitive to its strangeness supports the performance until the last sparkle reflected from the artificial nail."
– Maria Säkö, HS – Helsingin Sanomat
"Kasurinen is backed up on stage by the queer performance duo Amanda & Lydia, who practically drip with stage charisma."
– Tove Djupsjöbacka, HBL
May 18, 2024: One Dance Week (Plovdiv, Bulgaria)
