Paul de Leeuw

shinto lecture

Dramaturg Paul de Leeuw is one of the founding fathers of the legendary Dogtroep. He is interested in the possibilities of expressing the unspeakable and the invisible. During a professional encounter with Japanese theatre, he discovered a tradition that dates back thousands of years: shinto. As the first westerner De Leeuw was granted permission to study at the Yamakage Shinto school in Japan. After his training he became the first non-Japanese kannushi or shinto-priest.

In Amsterdam he built a Jinja, a space where ceremonies are held, and a dojo, which is open to all who seek to balance body and mind with nature. In the dojo he teaches shinto exercises, a balanced series of movement, breath, silence and sound, which have a purifying effect and promote the disturbed balance with nature.