New Kyd is a Zurich-based inter(-disciplinary) movement artist, DJ, and producer whose work traverses dance, sound, and visual media to explore identity, survival, and diasporic existence. With roots in modern dance and Yoruba heritage, their practice is an ongoing inquiry into the body's capacity to hold memory, strategies of survival through resistance, and transformation. Through improvisation, somatic research, and abstract storytelling, Kyd crafts performances that challenge conventional narratives of visibility and belonging.
Their independent works often delve into themes of decay, neglect, and the unseen labor of marginalized bodies. Projects such as RESTLESS: land of nois.e and their upcoming solo on Joyce Carol Vincent investigate urban isolation, social erasure, and the intersection of movement with forensic and psychological research.
In collaboration with institutions such as Tanzhaus Zürich, Museum Rietberg, and Schauspielhaus Zurich, Kyd has developed projects that merge performance with exhibition formats, often in dialogue with other artists and thinkers. Notable collaborations include working with Wu Tsang, Trajal Harrell, and Latefa Wiersch on performances and installations that extend beyond dance into interdisciplinary experimentation.
Whether through solo works, collaborations, or DJ sets, New Kyd's practice is a refusal to be silenced—a call to reimagine survival as a dynamic, embodied resistance. Kyd is guided by the ethos of "Kill Your Darlings"—challenges artistic boundaries, carving space for marginalized narratives in contemporary performance
Show
New Kyd
RESTLESS: land of nois.e
In RESTLESS: land of nois.e, New Kyd and Shuyue Miao Zhao perform two duets. The starting point for this were their experiences upon arriving in Zurich: they found it fascinating to discover that Switzerland, while rich in opportunities, still has social, political, racial, and economic barriers that create a dizzying sense of displacement and exclusion in them, thereby generating a longing for a collective community. In RESTLESS: land of nois.e, the duo shares an improvised journey through spasms of technology fatigue and visual "post-apologetic" utopias. These utopias are inspired by the following books: Rest is Resistance by Tricia Hersey, The Black Dancing Body by Brenda Dixon Gottschild, and I Want to Be Ready: Improvised Dance as a Practice of Freedom by Danielle Goldman. The framework of these writings allows the two artists to communicate through dance and movement, as well as music and sounds.
The 40-minutes intimate performance is woven together by imagined archetypes and a duet that unfolds live in the space and on the canvas. The bodies disappear between projections: visual art that encapsulates farming utopias of the last century. RESTLESS: land of nois.e creates an„structure of feeling" without a climax or a solution. We bear witness to a collective idea from the trans-diasporic perspective of the two artists – determined to mirror the rich complexity of their realities of displacement and their desire for intimacy.
Direction and Choreography New Kyd
Music Shuyue Miao Zhao
Performance New Kyd, Shuyue Miao Zhao
Dramaturgy Meloe Gennai
Dramaturgical support Tanzhaus Zürich Jessica Huber
Video Management und Technic Ali-Eddine Abd El Khalek
Sound Viktorio Jacobs
Lights Chiara Leonhardt
Costume and styling Brutus La Biche
Make Up Maé Willis
Headpiece Livia Rita
Film: Direction Arthur Henrique Sobrinho, New Kyd
Film: Direction of photography Moritz Hofstetter
Film: Camera assistance Caroline Hepting
Film: Styling assistance Michelle Wanzenried
Film: cast Tapiwa Svosve, Tiran Willemse, Ziwei Huang, Larissa Igihozo Murangira, Valentina Demicheli, Jitsattayakul, Julia Mangamba
Production management Kelly Tuke
Produktion assistance Ronin Kunz, Rona Bella
Picturea Moritz Hofstetter, Arthur Henrique Sobrinho
Coproduktion Tanzhaus Zürich
Supported by Stadt Zürich Kultur, Fachstelle Kultur Kanton Zürich, Schweizerische Interpretenstiftung SIS, Migros Kulturprozent