Dovydas Strimaitis (b. 1997) is a Lithuanian contemporary dance artist, living and working between France and Belgium. At the age of 12, Strimaitis started training in various dance styles, including line dancing, show dance, and eventually contemporary dance. In 2015, he enrolled in a dance bachelor's degree program at Codarts (NL). Strimaitis graduated from university in 2019, after completing his internship year with Jitti Chompee, Jan Martens, and Marina Mascarell. From 2019 to 2022, Strimaitis was a dancer at The National Ballet of Marseille, under the direction of La Horde, where he worked with the choreographers Peeping Tom, Alessandro Sciarroni, Lucinda Childs, Lasseindra Ninja, Tânia Carvalho, and Oona Doherty among others. From 2022, he is a freelance dancer, working with choreographers Alexandre Roccoli, Dalila Belaza, and Korsia.
Strimaitis started creating his choreographic oeuvre already at Codarts. His graduation piece "Still Waiting" (2018) received the highest possible evaluation in the university and was presented at Theater Rotterdam in Rotterdam and at Korzo in The Hague. This work gave birth to the name of the company Strimaitis would start in 2022.
In 2021, Strimaitis choreographed his first professional piece, a solo "The Art of Making Dances", which premiered at the New Baltic Dance Festival in Vilnius, Lithuania.
In 2022, Strimaitis' work "Hairy" was selected as a finalist in the competition Danse élargie organized by Théâtre de la Ville. A 20-minute version of the piece was part of the young choreographers' platform Danslokaal in the Netherlands. This version was followed by the Dutch tour of over 20 dates. In 2023, Strimaitis prolonged the original "Hairy" trio to 25 minutes. This version was the last installation of shorter pieces created in preparation for the full-evening piece of "Hairy" set to premiere in 2024.
His work "A Duet" premiered in 2023 at the festival ArtDanThé in Théatre de Vanves (France). The same year, Strimaitis presented "Triptych", a site-specific work at the Watermill Center in the USA.
Since 2019, Strimaitis has also been teaching workshops and classes of floorwork, both to professional dancers and dance students (in Lithuania, France, Italy, and Switzerland).
Photo by Theo Giacometti