Tsuneko Kokubo

Tsuneko (Koko) Kokubo lives near Silverton, B.C. in the Kootenay mountains with her partner Paul (Garbanzo) Gibbons. Paul and Koko escaped from the City some years ago to reclaim some clear cut forest territory overlooking Slocan Lake. It is some of the most beautiful country you can find and getting ever more so with the wild gardens they are planting. Koko graduated from the Vancouver School of Art (now called Emily Carr Institute of Art & Design) in 1960. Before moving to the Silverton area, Koko and Paul were co-artistic directors of Snake in the Grass Moving Theatre. They were artists in residence for many years at the Museum of Anthropology in Vancouver where their masked characters animated the space on a regular basis. In 1988 both Koko and Paul were artists in residence for a year at Na Bolom, a cultural and ecological centre in Chiapas, Mexico. Koko's costumes designs are featured in many Vancouver performing groups including Vancouver Moving Theatre, Katari Taiko, and Uzume Taiko as well as Montreal's Cirque du Soleil. For Kokoro Dance, Koko has made costumes for Fog Rolls In On Little Cats Feet, Woman, Rage, Zero to the Power, Aeon, Sunyata, Dance of the Dead, The Believer, ( ), and Esse.