Tero Saarinen

Tero Saarinen was born in 1964 in Pori, Finland.

Tero began dancing at age 16 with Lisa Noyonen in his hometown. He then moved to Helsinki and in 1982-86 studied in the Finnish National Opera Ballet School. In 1985, he was admitted to the Finnish National Ballet, where he was to dance until 1993, and quickly became a soloist next to Tommi Kitti. In 1989-91, he also danced with the Municipal Theater in Helsinki.
In 1989, he began choreographing independently. His first work, a solo piece called Ondekoza (1989), was influenced by oriental dance. He was later commissioned by Noyonen, his first teacher, to choreograph More Milk (1991) for her ensemble. Saarinen was successful as a soloist and performed worldwide. In 1990 and 1991, he was invited by Rina Schenfeld as a guest dancer in her program at the Karmiel Dance Festival.

In 1992-93, Saarinen lived in Asia and studied Nepalese dance at the Kala-Mandapa Institute in Kathmandu, under the instruction of Rajendra Shestra. He also visited Japan, where he trained in Butoh dance-theater with artist Kazuo Ohno in Yokohama, and in Kabuki theater at the famous Fujima School of Tokyo.
Upon his return from Asia Saarinen resumed his work as a freelance choreographer and began working as a freelance dancer. As such he performed mainly with Daniel Ezralow in the production of Francis Bacon directed by Johann Kresnik, and with Teatro Communale di Firenze, as well as in fashion shows by Issey Miyake. As a choreographer, he created for various companies, first in Finland, for the Finnish National Opera Ballet, PCD and Kuopio Festival. He later created for Batsheva, which boosted his international career. Commissioned by Ohad Naharin, he choreographed Behind and Flock for the company, both in 1994, and later also Un/Do (1998). In 1994 he also danced Jorma Uotinen’s B12 (1994) with Batsheva.

In 1995, Saarinen cofounded Tero Saarinen & Company Toothpick together with Yuval Pick, formerly a member of Batsheva and Henrikki Heikkilä from the Finnish National Ballet. In 1996, he staged his first piece for his company, Westward Ho!, and in 2002 it was renamed the Tero Saarinen Company.
Saarinen choreographed more than 40 works for his own company and others, including Nederlans Dans Theater (NDT), Ballet Lyon, Ballet Gulbenkian in Lisbon, Finnish National Ballet and Gothenburg Opera Ballet.
Saarinen continues to perform in solo dances. His best-known solo dances are Hunt (2002), performed 174 times in 32 countries until 2013, and Blue Lady (2008).

Saarinen has received numerous acknowledgements of his work as an artist. In 2001 he was awarded the Finland Prize and, in 2005 the Pro Finlandia medal and in 2008 the Finnish Cultural Foundation Award. In 2004 he was nominated Chevalier de L’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, France.