PROGRAMME
Lenio Kaklea is a dancer, choreographer, director and artist born in Athens and based in Paris.
She studied at the National Conservatory of Contemporary Dance in Athens, where she trained in classical ballet as well as American modern techniques and repertories such as Martha Graham, Merce Cunningham and José Limón. In 2005, she was awarded the Pratsika Foundation Prize and moved to France, where she studied at the Cndc in Angers, under the direction of Emmanuelle Huynh, and collaborated with prominent figures of the European dance scene such as Alexandra Bachzetsis, Boris Charmatz, Claudia Triozzi, François Chaignaud and Cecilia Bengolea. In 2011, she completed the SPEAP programme, an experimentation in arts and politics master directed by Bruno Latour at Sciences Po in Paris.
Since 2009, Lenio Kaklea’s artistic practice uses a wide range of media including choreography, text and video and is informed by feminism and postcolonial critique. In her work, she explores the production of subjectivity and reveals the intimate spaces in which we construct our identity.
Her work has been presented by institutions and festivals throughout Europe and the United States, such as the Centre Pompidou, Sadler’s Wells, Kunstenfestivaldesarts, Festival d’Automne, the Serpentine, Bourse de Commerce-Pinault Collection, Palazzo Grassi-Pinault Collection, New York Live Arts, ImPulsTanz – Vienna International Dance Festival, Athens Epidaurus Festival, the National Greek Opera, and Les presses du réel. Her performances have joined public and private collections such as the CNAP-National Centre of Fine Arts and KADIST Foundation.
Along with her personal choreographic work, she is engaged in collaborations with other artists. In 2013, Kaklea presented a collaboration with the American choreographer Lucinda Childs on the music by Ryoji Ikeda. In 2022, she collaborated with the Italian fashion house Bottega Veneta and created a performance at Punta Della Dogana with clothes designed by Matthieu Blazy.
In more recent years, Kaklea’s work has been the subject of important commissions. In 2019, she was awarded the Dance Prize of the Hermès Italia Foundation and the Triennial of Milan and created the autobiographical solo Ballad. In 2021, she choreographed Age of Crime, a piece for nine dancers, on the occasion of the bicentenary of the Greek Revolution at the Athens Epidaurus Festival, as well as Sonatas and Interludes, the emblematic work for prepared piano by John Cage, accompanied on stage by pianist Orlando Bass.
In 2024, she was awarded the 25th Pernod Ricard Award, and created the film An Alphabet for the Camera. The same year, she created Chemical Joy, a stage work for five dancers from BODHI PROJECT Ensemble, a contemporary dance company based in Salzburg and founded by ex-member of the Merce Cunningham Company, Susan Quinn.
The year 2025 marks another collaboration with Bottega Veneta. Kaklea choreographed Craft is our language, a new campaign marking the 50th anniversary of the house’s iconic leather weave, Intrecciato. The campaign, shot by Jack Davison, features artists from the fields of film, music, literature, and sports, such as Julianne Moore; Dario Argento; Vicky Krieps; Troy Kotsur; Tyler, The Creator; Lorenzo Viotti; Zadie Smith; and Lorenzo Musetti, and celebrates Bottega Veneta handcraft, as well as the wider beauty of hand gestures.
Her latest stage work for seven performers, The Birds, premiered at Montpellier Danse Festival 2025 and will tour in Marseille, Brussels, Kortrijk, Los Angeles and Paris, among other cities.
2025
