Brigel Gjoka

Brigel Gjoka is a Franco-Albanian choreographer, teacher, and performer. Trained at the Tirana Ballet School and the Rosella Hightower School in Cannes, he has pursued a professional career with the Ballet de l’Opéra national du Rhin, the Staatstheater Mainz, and the Nederlands Dans Theater. In January 2011, Gjoka joined The Forsythe Company. From 2014 to 2020, Brigel Gjoka directed Art Factory International Bologna, devoting himself to the development of young artists and choreographic research. He regularly works as a teacher, leading workshops for the Tokyo Ballet, The Juilliard School, the Biennale College Danza in Venice, the Royal Danish Summer Intensive, the CND in Paris and Lyon, and the University of Lausanne. In 2015, he was awarded the Leonide Massine – Dancer of the Year, Contemporary Stage Award, at the Positano Premia la Danza. Brigel Gjoka has been touring with Friends of Forsythe since 2024. 

With a background in ballet and folk dance, and shaped by its immersion in contemporary dance for over two decades, Brigel Gjoka’s approach to movement is part of a powerful dialogue between technique, structure, and freedom. His work explores how to deepen effort with ease, while pushing the limits of physicality. Speed and deceleration are used as tools to go through space, refine clarity, timing, and intention. The body learns to break down each joint, allowing movement to unfold with precision and sensitivity. Mechanical energy is captured and redirected to support efficiency, responsiveness, and embodied presence. Gjoka explores improvisation as a tool to bend the rules and push the limits of the body, developing skills by blending different dance styles. During the workshop, campers will explore limb coordination within complex configurations and will be invited to engage in physical body language, delving into the universe and choreographic repertoire of Gjoka’s latest piece, Negotiating Peace.