Arkadi Zaides (b. 1979, Homel, Belarus, former USSR) works as a choreographer, performer and researcher. He holds a master’s degree from the AHK Academy of Theatre and Dance in Amsterdam, a PhD in the Arts (Dance) from the University of Antwerp, and a PhD in the Arts (Drama) from Ghent University, where he is also a visiting professor. From 2024 to 2027, he is an associate artist at Agora – Cité Internationale de la Danse in Montpellier.

Choreography

In his artistic practice Zaides investigates the capacity of choreography to engage with contemporary societal urgencies by working with documentary materials. His multidisciplinary projects continuously navigate between spaces in which structural violence produces specific forms of social choreography, and the artistic space in which these choreographies are interrogated, displaced, and reconfigured through embodied interventions, performative translation, and hybrid staging. His stage works and video installations have been presented at 4+4 Days in Motion, Prague; Aoyama Round Theater, Tokyo; Arts Station Foundation, Poznań; Athens Epidaurus Festival; BAD Bilbao; Bellevue Theatre, Amsterdam; CDC Toulouse; Dance Box, Kobe; Fabrik Potsdam; Festival Actoral, Marseille; Firehall Arts Centre, Vancouver; FIT – Festival Internacional de Teatro, Santiago; FIT Lugano; HAU – Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin; Impart Art Center, Wrocław; Julidans, Amsterdam; Künstlerhaus Mousonturm, Frankfurt am Main; Korzo Theater, The Hague; La Bâtie – Festival de Genève; LaMaMa Experimental Theatre Club, New York; Latitudes Contemporaines, Lille; MAI – Montréal, arts interculturels; Mes de Danza, Seville; Montpellier Danse; NYLA – New York Live Arts, New York; Onassis Stegi, Athens; Oriente Occidente, Rovereto; Pact Zollverein, Essen; Santarcangelo Festival; Session House, Tokyo; Shanghai Dance Festival; Stadsschouwburg Rotterdam; Tanzhaus Zürich; Théâtre de la Ville, Paris; Théâtre la Vignette – Université Paul-Valéry 3, Montpellier; Théâtre National de Chaillot, Paris; Weimar Nationaltheater, among many others.

Curatorial Work

Zaides continuously develops platforms that promote critical discourse around contemporary performance-making. Together with dramaturge and researcher Sandra Noeth, he initiated Violence of Inscriptions at Hebbel am Ufer (HAU) in Berlin (2016–2018). The project brought together artists, thinkers, and human-rights activists to examine the role of the body in producing, maintaining, legitimizing, representing, and aestheticizing structural violence. In close collaboration with the Goethe-Institut Israel, Zaides curated Moves Without Borders in Jaffa and Tel Aviv (2012–2015), inviting avant-garde choreographers to present performances and lead workshops. Together with choreographer Anat Danieli, he also curated the New Dance Project in Jerusalem (2010–2011), which provided emerging choreographers with professional guidance, production assistance, and financial support.

Awards 

Zaides received the Emile Zola Prize for Performing Arts for demonstrating engagement in human rights issues in his work Archive (2013). His work Quiet received a grant from the Israeli Ministry of Culture and Sport (2013). He was the recipient of the Israeli Lottery Foundation Landau Award (2012). He won the Israeli Ministry of Culture and Sport Young Artist Prize (2008, 2009, 2011). He received the annual Rosenblum Award for excellence in the arts (2010), and his work Solo Colores received the Kurt Jooss Award (2010).

Collaborations 

Zaides took part in the work process of the following performances and projects: INFINI project (Jozef Wouters, Brussels, 2015), Durcheinander (deufert&plischke, Berlin, 2015), Contracting Fears (Bridge On A Wall, Murcia, 2010), Ladies First (Matanicola, Berlin, 2007), Strawberry Cream and Gunpowder (Yasmeen Godder, Tel Aviv, 2006), Eyezaurus Frida (Noa Dar, Tel Aviv, 1999). From 1999 to 2004, Zaides was a member of both the Batsheva Ensemble and the Batsheva Dance Company under the artistic direction of Ohad Naharin.

Institut des Croisements

Institut des Croisements is a French non-profit association founded and directed by Simge Gücük and Arkadi Zaides, with Marc Lainé and Gisèle Depuccio serving as board members. The association’s mission is to develop, produce, and promote Zaides’ work, as well as to represent other contemporary artists and produce artistic and cultural events.