Julian Owusu

Julian Owusu is an Oulu-based multidisciplinary dance artist, whose artistic core lies in community building practices, pedagogy, Hip Hop culture, dance, spoken word poetry, facilitation, decolonial practices and reimagining. Julian has worked as dancer, choreographer, actor and facilitator with institutions like Zodiak – Centre for New Dance, Jojo – Oulu Dance Centre, the Oulu City Theatre, Yle Finland, UrbanApa and Taikabox ry. He has taught at the Theatre Academy of the Helsinki University of Arts, the Oulu University of Applied science as well as in numerous commercial dance schools.

In addition to direct artistic work, Julian is a member of the leading group of the Hiphop in Finland research network, a board member of the Urban dance art support association (UTTry), the chairperson on the board of The Nordic House of Reykjavík as well as a member of the supervisory board of the Finnish Cultural Foundation. Julian Owusu worked as Regional Artist for Youth Culture at the Arts Promotion Centre of Finland (Taike) in Northern Ostrobothnia and Kainuu regions between 2016 and 2021.

At the moment, Julian’s artistic work is supported by a one-year artistic grant from the Swedish Culture Fund in Finland. He is working on multiple projects, with the most prominent right now being the Xulu202x project which is part of the Oulu2026 European Capital of Culture official programme.