DEBBY KAJIYAMA

Debby Kajiyama, a San Francisco Bay Area native, has been performing since 1994. She has performed with Dandelion Dancetheater, June Watanabe in Company, ZACCHO Dance Theater, and the Dance Brigade. She is currently an apprentice member of Somei Yoshino Taiko Ensemble. Kajiyama's interests lie in the intersection of performance, cultural studies, and social change. She is a member of TsukimiKai, an intergenerational group of primarily Japanese American artists, activists, and scholars. In 2005, Kajiyama traveled with TsukimiKai to Cuba to share Obon Festival folk dances and music and to conduct oral histories of the Japanese Diaspora in Cuba. Four years ago, she founded the Art and Social Activism component of the Annual Human Rights Summit at San Francisco State University. In 2009, she was the recipient of a Djerassi Resident Artists Program residency and a Silicon Valley Community Foundation fellowship.