TomoyaKawamura

Tomoya Kawamura is a Tokyo-born, Berlin-based actor, mask theatre performer, director, and movement director based in Berlin with over 20 years of experience in both contemporary theatre and traditional Japanese performing arts, having trained in Kabuki as an apprentice under master actor Ichikawa Omezo VI and in Kanze-school Noh theatre under Yoshiteru Takeda. His artistic practice is rooted in Western contemporary theatre, incorporating elements of traditional Japanese performance to develop a distinctive physical language and approach to storytelling.

He has collaborated with acclaimed director Andrea Breth, performing in Ich hab die Nacht geträumet at the Berliner Ensemble ), Madama Butterfly at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence and Opéra national de Lyon in France ), and Turandot at Oper Frankfurt in Germany (2026). In both Madama Butterfly and Turandot, he also served as a movement director and collaborator, developing a physical language that bridges traditional Japanese movement and Western theatrical performance.

His solo mask theatre work Letters from Chiran, exploring the human experience of war through personal and historical narratives, has toured internationally, including performances at the Grotowski Institute in Poland, Tranzit Festival in Croatia, BABEL F.A.S.T. in Romania, the Seoul Mono Drama Festival in South Korea, as well as in Vienna and Milan. Alongside his performance work, he has led workshops in Berlin and at Tranzit Festival in Croatia, combining Japanese traditional performing arts, including Noh theatre and samurai combat techniques, with Western acting methods. He is currently developing a research and performance project with the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, bringing Noh theatre and Bauhaus theatrical practices into dialogue, with a premiere planned for 2027.