Program Books/Ohad Naharin
A black-and-white headshot of Ohad Naharin, an older man with salt-and-pepper hair wearing a plaid shirt, staring into the camera

Ohad Naharin

house choreographer

Ohad Naharin, House Choreographer of Batsheva Dance Company and creator of the Gaga movement language, was born in 1952 in Mizra, Israel. He joined the Batsheva Dance Company in 1974. During his first year, guest choreographer Martha Graham invited him to join her own company in New York, where Naharin later made his choreographic debut in 1980. Over the next decade, he presented works in New York and abroad, including pieces for Batsheva Dance Company, the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company, and Nederlands Dans Theater. At the same time, he worked with his first wife, Mari Kajiwara, and a group of dancers in New York. Naharin and Kajiwara continued to work together until she died from cancer in 2001. In 1990, Naharin was appointed Artistic Director of the Batsheva Dance Company, and in the same year, he established the company’s junior division, the Young Ensemble. He has since created more than 40 works for both companies and set pieces on many others. After almost 30 years of leading Batsheva, Naharin stepped down as Artistic Director in 2018; he continues to serve as the company’s House Choreographer.

In addition to his stagework, Naharin also developed Gaga, an innovative movement language based on research into heightening sensation and imagination, becoming aware of form, finding new movement habits, and going beyond familiar limits. Gaga is the daily training language of Batsheva’s dancers and has spread globally among both dancers and nondancers.

Under the pseudonym Maxim Waratt, Naharin has also composed music for many pieces he has created for the company.

Naharin’s work has also been featured 
in several films, including Tomer Heymann’s In Out of Focus (2007) and the Heymann Brothers’ Mr. Gaga (2015).

A citizen of both Israel and the United States, Naharin currently lives in Israel with his wife, dancer and costume designer Eri Nakamura, and their two children, Noga and Asa.