Andrew de Lotbinière Harwood has been dancing for over 30 years and has developed an outstanding reputation as a choreographer, dancer, improviser, and teacher. He is the artistic director of AH HA productions based in Montreal, Canada.

Andrew de Lotbinière Harwood was introduced to dance by Linda Rubin in 1975. It was during his years of study with Ms. Rubin that he met Peter Bingham and Helen Clarke with whom he formed the influencial dance troupe Fulcrum. Between 1976 and 1986, his passion for dance focused mainly on Contact Improvisation. During this period he studied intensively with Steve Paxton and Nancy Stark Smith, among many others. He later taught and performed with them, along with a host of other extraordinary “contacters”. During this same period of growth, Harwood studied Release Technique with Joan Skinner and Nancy Topf, improvisation with Barbara Dilley, Meredith Monk, Simone Forti and Lisa Nelson and the martial art Aikido. He was also a regular teacher/performer at the School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam. From 1983 to 1985 he danced with the Jo Lechay Company.

During the early 90’s, Harwood developed a number of important artistic associations. He was invited to teach and perform by the artistic directors of the Bates Dance Festival, the International Tanzwochen (Vienna) and the Improvisation Festival in New York. He also danced for La Compagnie Marie Chouinard (1990-94) and La Fondation Jean-Pierre Perreault (1994), instigated and curated a successful improvisation series called Instant Instinct and, since 1992, has been part of an important ongoing annual teaching and performing collaboration with The Echo Case (Peter Bingham, Marc Boivin, Coat Cooke, Ron Samworth, Robert Meister and Harwood).

The main components that deeply influence the company’s creative process are intuition, perception, soulful states, chance procedures and transformation and makes use of various improvisational strategies and Contact Improvisation. Over the past 10 years Harwod has created the following works: My desire has had the momentum of hunger, Reflex, H.A.S.K., Réflexe (suite), 6th Sens, Sens Cible, Marrow and Blurred (beyond control), Not to Know, Nomadic Strategies, l’Ubiquiste, and Les Cinq Mouvements.

Harwood was awarded the Canada Council for the Arts prestigious Jacqueline Lemieux Award in 2000. The same year, he founded his own company called AH HA Productions.

In 2001, he created Instinctin coproduction with the Festival Buhnenwerkstatt in Graz. In September 2001, he created a large-scale improvisational performance in association with Benoît Lachambre, artistic director of par b.l.eux. This event, called Not to Know, recruits some of the most distinguished international improvisers in the field of dance, music, set design and lighting; and was co-produced by Montreal’s Festival international de nouvelle danse in October 2001, co-produced by the ImpulsTanz Festival in Vienna in July 2002 and produced by the Festival Montpellier Danse in August 2003. Not to Know will be presented at the Festival Les Antipodes in Brest in March 2005. In May 2002, Italy’s La Biennale produced his solo Sens Cible and in June 2002 his creation Nomadic Strategies was co-produced by the Canada Dance Festival. His piece for ten men entitled Ani*mâles was co-produced by Danse-Cité in November 2002 and was presented to critical acclaim at the Monument National in Montreal. His latest piece l’Ubiquiste presented in les maisons de la culture during the spring of 2005 was also an artistic success. He is currently developing his new piece to be produced in Montreal at the SAT (Société des Arts Technologiques) in February 2005. The Five Mouvements includes 18 artist in all and is being created in collaboration with renowned Canadian choreographers and performers Ginette Laurin, Marc Béland, Pierre-Paul Savoie, Lin Snelling and Louise Bédard.