Thomas Freundlich

Choreographer and dancer

Thomas Freundlich (b. 1975) has graduated from the professional training program of the Finnish National Ballet School in 2001. Since then, he has created some 30 choreographic works encompassing ensemble pieces, solos, contemporary opera, theatre and dance video, and has appeared as a dancer in a dozen countries across the world. He has studied jazz dance with Russell Adamson in addition to furthering his dance training in New York and at the Boston Conservatory. In mime, movement theatre and dramatic dance, Mr. Freundlich’s teachers were renowned mime artists Adam Darius and Kazimir Kolesnik.

Mr. Freundlich’s latest dance work is Waterline, choreographed and danced with Neil Owens. The 40-minute dance theatre duet exploring the maritime heritage of the Baltic Sea was premiered in the grand boat hall of Vellamo Maritime Centre in Kotka, Finland to critical and popular acclaim.

Thomas Freundlich’s recent work includes the dance film North Horizon, co-authored with Valtteri Raekallio. Shot on location in the arctic wilderness of Spitsbergen, the 14-minute work was premiered in 2010 and has been seen at 18 international dance and film festivals worldwide.

In 2009, Thomas Freundlich’s solo Futureproof was premiered at the 13th International Solo-Dance-Theatre Festival in Stuttgart. His recent dance works also include Actuator, a groundbreaking duet for dancer and industrial robot which was premiered at the Zodiak Center for New Dance in Helsinki in 2008.

Since 2005, Thomas Freundlich has collaborated with Helsinki Skaala Opera on six contemporary operas, including the highly praised Finnish premieres of Philip Glass’s operas Les Enfants Terribles, based on the novel by Jean Cocteau, and In the Penal Colony, after Franz Kafka. In 2010, Mr. Freundlich appeared as dancer/actor and choreographer in Skaala Opera’s premiere of Madame de Sade, composed by Juha T. Koskinen and based on the play by Yukio Mishima.

In 2005, Mr. Freundlich’s work Dreamcatcher, performed by Tanja Kuisma, won two awards, including the Audience Prize, at the at the 9th International Solo-Dance-Theatre Festival in Stuttgart. The solo has subsequently been seen at numerous dance festivals in Germany, the Netherlands, Finland and Spain. In the same year, Mr. Freundlich’s contemporary dance works Airflow and Sleepless were realized in collaboration with Pasi Hirvonen, one of Finland’s leading artists on the classical and contemporary accordion.

Thomas Freundlich has served as a board member of numerous dance organizations in Finland, and is a co-founder (with Valtteri Raekallio) of Liikekieli.com, Finland’s online dance magazine. In November 2008, Raekallio and Freundlich accepted the Finnish State Award for Dance Arts, one of Finland’s highest accolades in dance, on behalf of Liikekieli.com.

Mr. Freundlich’s work has been acknowledged with over 20 grants and awards from cultural foundations, arts councils and festivals in Finland and abroad. From 2011 to 2013, he is the recipient of a three-year artist’s grant from the Arts Council of Finland.

Photo: Peter Forsgard