Trained in contemporary  dance and hailing from Aotearoa, NZ,  while residing in Melbourne Australia, indigenous performance artist Forest Kapo has tribal affiliations with North Island tribes Te Atiawa, and Ngāti Raukawa,.

A multi-disciplinary approach to suit environments, Forest has facilitated and choreographed, and collaborated in performance events and festivals around the world, developing artistic networks in Germany, USA, India, Australia and New Zealand.

Inside their future forward community activations, rituals, performances composed and live sound work is a socio-political, focus, concerned primarily with climate change, indigenous identity and gender politics, interpreted through a cosmic- comics lens, a genre introduced by writer Italo Calveno.

Mythologies and text are used to navigate through time and geographies while contemporary narrative are explored using sound, movement,  installation and performance.

With renegade spirit, Forest enjoys being an artist. which includes directing, teaching & facilitating improvisations and performances in both Auckland Aotearoa and Melbourne Australia.

2021 January ‘Earth Voices’,  is pre-production research, developing a global artistic concept, choreographic method, and a manifesto to visualise the mindset and quality of the indigenous languages through the language of dance & movement. 

The project showcases research, ideation and experimentation by artists from different parts of the world such as: Australia, Greenland, Japan, India & Norway and with the support of the Norwegian Arts Council – Kulturradet, Preliminary Project Performing Arts Funding. 

May Witness // the act of.

A six week residency, work in development, accumulating  in an installational site specific performance that unravels migrancy, the necessity of culture the desire to belong and the reality of climate change. Bring in a unique way a sense of place and identity how its  realised and translated  as we move through myriad of uncertainty based around time, locations countries and cultures.

A Graceful revolution. Director for Annie Halcombe and her self devised show.

2020. January. Queer Pavilion- Pride Festival Auckland Albert Park.

Ghosting the queer.- A video installation exploring trans/queer identity.

February. Artifact. Footnote Dance Company. Wellington

Artificial intelligence, and indigeneity how will the future be determined, and how will indigenous cultures be heard?

Choreographer for Rosie Tapsell. Music by Emi Pogoni.

December. I waenga a film installation. Touch Compass commissioned seven artists to respond to the theme of time and space with each artist offering their different perspective.

These creatives from across Aotearoa and Australia offer windows into their experiences of indigenous time, disabled time and everything in-between.

EDWA Auckland  2020.  i’ll grow back designed and performed by val smith, with Naarm-based artist Forest Vicky Kapo via Zoom and their collection of plant life, present digitally and onstage. The performance lived multiply: val smith ‘live’ onstage, Forest Kapo Zooming in on an iPad, and their cohabitation in a Facebook livestream displayed on a floor-to-ceiling projector. A response to trans gender identity,  plant life, and corvid.

2019. February.

• Aotearoa Experimental Perfomance Week with  performance, John Doe.

A Somatic improvisation workshop based around the 5 stages of love and a panelist in a post colonisation panel led discussion.

July. Matariki.

• Inheritance co devised with Jess Holly Bates direction by Alyx Duncan. A show that enquires around NZ’s class systems and structures.  

September.  Vitalstitix Adelaide 

• Adhocracy A performance art residency. 

October. Tempo Festival.

Karanga. A dance, sound, movement  theatre piece.

2018  performances and artist  highlights  include:

• A 30 min Sound work Burning Questions  with Canadian artist Carolin Kunzle for the Canadian Pirate Radio weekend festival in January 2018.
• Black-Out by Auckland Artist and Writer  Tru Paraha – A dance theatre activation and installation; performed 15th and 16th of February 2018 @ the Kenneth Myer centre.
• Felt Room by USA/NZ Body Cartography artist Olive Beringa.  A 3hr durational sensory unfolding using scores and the darkness to create a cellular somatic experience performed during the Performance Arcade festival in  February Wellington NZ.
• The 5th body for Tru Paraha  Auckland performance conference. August.
• The kite maker, A solo work made for the  September Short and Sweet festival, in Auckland.
• A 10min sound score for Mapura a community centre arts program for mixed people with mixed abilities.
• Attendance of the  5 day La Pocha Nostros residency  held in Oct in Mullumbimby NSW.
• A  workshop & performance in Sydney  held by Tessa de Quincey Company.

Teaching highlights include,

• Kinetic Orality held in  April in Auckland in conjunction with PAWA a performance artist collective.
• Sound Workshops for Mapura  a mixed abilities community centre in Auckland.

2017 artistic highlights include:

• A  two week residency, researching text driven performance structures for mix media work The weight of the Other for collective The house of Daughters. Sponsored by Atamira dance company.
• A Collaboration with I Move Lab partners; Jack Gray, and Dakot-ta Alcamacho, producing a small Installation and supporting performance work, that engaged with their Two Flows – Tree to River – A BARRING YANABUL/YIRRAMBOI festival activation in Melbourne Australia.
• Working alongside Australian Angela Clark, for a feminist performance installation, The Last Ovum  held in September’s Melbourne Fringe Festival at Testing ground in Melbourne Australia.
• A one week residency, and Showing  thanks to Wellesley Studios, and Tempo festival, with The house of Daughters to prepare for shimmer 2018.
• ShaWoman A solo performance work created for Pawa Wellington festival in November NZ.
• A one month residency in Mori Hills  Chandigarh India, curated by Alexa Wilson.