Café Reason Butoh Dance Theatre is an experimental performance group specialising in butoh, the iconoclastic dance form that originated in postwar Japan.

Based in Oxford, Café Reason is the only permanent butoh company in the UK outside London and has achieved a fine reputation for its innovative theatre, site-specific and improvised performances. Our members at any one time are drawn from many backgrounds, each bringing to the group their different bodies, training, skills, and life experiences.

From its establishment in 1997, Café Reason has been committed to an ongoing process of exploration. Its regular classes (on the 2nd and 4th Saturdays of each month, currently in Old Marston) experiment with form and movement, and our developing body of work aims to extend the boundaries of perception and the interpretation and expression of universal human experience. Our work increasingly displays a synergy with other artists and art forms, combining dance with original music, poetry, installation art, and video.

We have performed in Oxford and London venues and in addition to our experimental theatre work, Café Reason is well-known in the streets and open spaces of Oxford - and further afield - for our improvisations and site-specific performances. We have performed in a wide variety of venues - parks, allotments, graveyards, beaches, cathedrals, art-galleries, and cafés! We have received numerous grants and commissions, and enthusiastic reviews.