M

• VICTORIA MALIN

  © Hugo Glendinning

  Dancer (UK)

  gained a degree in Psychology and Drama and Theatre Studies in 2003. She subsequently realised her love of dance when training on the Candoco Foundation Course in Dance for Disabled People. After graduating Vicky went on to perform for Blue Eyed Soul Dance Company, touring with works by Liam Steel (‘Stan Won’t Dance’) and aerial artist Jess Curtis. In September 2007, whilst also working as freelance Dance and Drama teacher, Vicky performed an aerial solo in the Liberty Festival at Trafalgar Square.

• AMELIE MALLMANN

  © Christian Brachwitz

  Dramaturge (D)

  completed the study course dramaturgy at the Bayerische Theaterakademie August Everding in Munich. From 2002 to 2005 she was engaged as a dramaturge at the Landestheater Linz. In 2005 she moved to Berlin to work as a dramaturge and theatre pedagogue at the Theater an der Parkaue until 2011. Since 2011 Amelie Mallmann has been working as a freelance dramaturge and theatre pedagogue. In addition, she teaches at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste Braunschweig and the Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena. Since 2006 she has been a board member of the Dramaturgische Gesellschaft.

• JÖRG MANNES

  © Gert Weigelt

  Ballet director

  Jörg Mannes was born in Vienna. At the age of eight he began his training at the ballet school of the Wiener Staatsoper,  which he completed in Monte Carlo, London and New York . In 1991 he went as a solo dancer to Heinz Spoerli at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein/Düsseldorf. Mannes gave his debut as a choreographer in Düsseldorf in 1994. Guest choreographies repeatedly led him to, among others, Montréal, Indianapolis and the Bolshoi Theatre Moscow, and most recently the Badische Staatstheater Karlsruhe and the Bayerische Staatsoper München. From 2001 to 2004 Jörg Mannes worked as head choreographer at the Stadttheater Bremerhaven and from 2004 to 2006 at the Landestheater Linz, before he was engaged at the Staatsoper Hannover at the beginning of the 2006/07 season as a ballet director.

• PROF. DR. SUSAN MANNING

  Dance scholar (USA)

  is a Professor of English, Theatre, and Performance Studies at Northwestern University. She is the author of ‘Ecstasy and the Demon: The Dances of Mary Wigman’ (1993; 2nd ed. 2006) and ‘Modern Dance, Negro Dance: Race in Motion’ (2004); curator of ‘Danses noires/blanche Amérique’ (2008); and coeditor of ‘New German Dance Studies’ (2012). Currently, she serves as Principal Investigator for a Mellon-funded initiative on ‘Dance Studies in/and the Humanities’ and as dramaturge for Reggie Wilson’s new work for Fist and Heel Performance Group, titled ‘(project) Moseses Project’. 

• PROF. DR. OLIVER MARCHART

  © Mario Lang

  Sociologist, political theorist (D)

  Since 2012 Oliver Marchart has been professor of sociology with a main emphasis on the sociology of art at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. He has published a number of books including: ‘Neoismus. Avantgarde und Selbsthistorisierung’ (1997); ‘Hegemonie im Kunstfeld. Die documenta-Ausstellungen dX, D11, d12 und die Politik der Biennalisierung’ (2008); ‘Die politische Differenz. Zum Denken des Politischen bei Nancy, Lefort, Badiou, Laclau und Agamben’ (2010).

• GUIDO MARKOWITZ

  

  Choreographer(D)

  studied classical ballet, contemporary and modern dance at the Iwanson International School of Contemporary Dance, Munich. Since 2004 Guido Markowitz has been working as a freelance choreographer and director. He includes all types of genres in his work, operating with an intergenerational approach and taking up influences of urban styles of dance. His view of contemporary events is always very analytical, he brings his impressions to the stage with the means of contemporary dance and new media. Guido Markowitz also works with young people in many of his projects. With the choreography ‘Abflug’, he starts an entire series of pieces for youths, at the tanzhaus NRW and elsewhere.

  gm-dance.de

• DR. DANIÈLE-CLAUDE MARTIN

  Physicist, movement researcher (D)

  has been practising Chinese movement arts (Qi Gong, Tai Ji Quan, Yi Quan) for more than 20 years and was trained in Spiraldynamik®. She worked for several years as a movement therapist in a psychosomatic clinic. She studied biotensegrity under Dr. Stephen Levin and Tom Flemons. In 2009, she initiated an international study group on biotensegrity. She has her own practice in which she teaches three-dimensional movement coordination based on biotensegrity.

• SUSANNE MARTIN

  

  Choreographer (D)

  studied dance at the Rotterdam Dance Academy, at Folkwang Hochschule, Essen, and received her MA from Hochschulübergreifendes Zentrum Tanz Berlin. Currently she’s a PhD researcher at Middlesex University, UK. Based in Berlin, she works as choreographer, performer and teacher in the field of contemporary dance. She creates performances internationally as soloist and in collaboration with Bronja Novak (Göteborg), Theater M21 (Göttingen) and Gabriele Reuter (Berlin). Her work focuses on the relation between improvisation and choreography and narrations of the ageing body. 

• BETTINA MASUCH

  © Monika Rittershaus

  Curator (D)

  studied German studies and philosophy in Düsseldorf as well as applied theatre studies in Gießen. Afterwards she worked as a dramaturge at, among others, the Kaaitheater Brussels, Theaterhaus Jena, Schauspielhaus Zürich, and the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz in Berlin. From 2003 to 2009 she was dance curator at Hebbel am Ufer Berlin and has been the artistic director of the Springdance Festival in Utrecht (NL) since 2009, and the artistic director of the festival ‘Tanz im August’ since 2013. In 2014 she will become the director of the tanzhaus nrw in Düsseldorf.

• DR. AVANTHI MEDURI

  Dance scholar (IND/UK)

  born in Chennai, Avanthi Meduri received her PhD in Performance Studies from New York University in 1996 and has carried out archival and ethnographic fieldwork in India, the US and the UK. Trained in Bharatanatyam and Kuchipudi, two classical forms of Indian dance, Meduri’s performance work explores the intersections between archives, biography, history and performance and locates her performance work within the intellectual framework of what is known as 'practice as research' in higher education. With performance projects she created a global South Asian dance pedagogy for Indian performing arts at Roehampton University, where she is currently a reader in Dance and Performance Studies.

• LEJLA MEHANOVIC

  Film and theatre scholar (A) 

  completed her studies of German philology and theatre, film and media studies at the Universität Wien. After collaborating in several theatre and film productions, she has been assistant dramaturge and artistic director of Tanzquartier Wien since 2009. Research focuses: trauma and body therapy, game theory and game structures in the context of social conflict situations. 

• PROF. DR. KATHERINE MEZUR

  

  Dance scholar (USA)

  is a freelance dance scholar and dramaturge based in San Francisco, CA. Her recent positions are Research Fellow at International Research Center ‘Interweaving Performance Cultures’ of the Freie Universität Berlin, and academic appointments at University of Washington, Georgetown University, CAL Arts, McGill, University of California Santa Barbara, University of California Davis. She holds a PhD in Theatre and Dance (Asian Performance), University of Hawai'i, Manoa. Publications include, ‘Beautiful Boys/Outlaw Bodies: Devising Female-likeness on the Kabuki Stage’, ‘Fleeting Moments: The Vanishing Acts of Phantom Women in Dumb Type’, ‘Nowhere Girls: 'Mutantcy' and Reversibility in Japanese Performance Art.’ Her current project is ‘Stranger Communities, Transient Acts: Migration and Dance Labor.’

• MICHAELDOUGLAS KOLLEKTIV

  © MichaelDouglas Kollektiv

  (D)

  is an affiliation of dancers from the contemporary dance scene that is newly configuring the customary form of the structures of independent groups oriented towards choreographers. Founded in 2009 by the choreographers and dancers Michael Maurissens and Douglas Bateman, formerly of Pretty Ugly Tanz Köln, and seated in Cologne, the MichaelDouglas Kollektiv defines itself as a multidisciplinary space for contemporary artistic creativity. The members of the collective develop themselves through collaborations with different artists and the exchange of different styles and modalities of artistic work as actors in the field of contemporary dance.

  mdkollektiv.de

• BERTRAM MÜLLER

  Director of the tanzhaus nrw, Düsseldorf (D)

  graduated in 1972 in philosophy and theology from the Universität Heidelberg and in 1981 completed his studies with a degree in clinical psychology. In 1978 he was the founding chairman of the culture society ‘die werkstatt e.V.’, the precursor of the tanzhaus nrw, which he directs today. From 1993 – 96 Müller was, among other things, official expert with the European Commission, ‘Kaleidoscope’ programme, founding member of the European Institute of the Arts Dance Section, co-founder of the European Dance Development Center Arnhem/Düsseldorf, and from 1997 onwards founding director of the World Dance Alliance – Europe. He has been a national and international expert and jury member in the field of dance since 1994. In 2004 Müller was the director of Tanzplattform Deutschland. Since 2005 he has co-founded projects funded by the EU (among others, Chin-A-moves, IDEE, Modul Dance, Fresh Tracks Europe, Kore-A-moves) and in 2006 he initiated ‘Take-off: Junger Tanz. Tanzplan Düsseldorf’. Since 2009 he has been president of the European Dancehouse Network and director of the International Dance Artist Service NRW. In 1991 Müller was awarded the ‘Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres’ by Jacques Lang of the French Ministry of Culture and Education.

  tanzhaus-nrw.de

• TOBI MÜLLER

  Journalist (D)

  lives in Berlin as a freelance cultural journalist with a main focus on pop music and theatre. In Switzerland he worked for various print media and Swiss television. Today he writes texts and produces broadcasts for, among others, Deutschlandradio Kultur, NZZ am Sonntag, Spex, Tages-Anzeiger, Theater Heute, and Radio DRS. Müller also works as a dramaturge and presenter for, among others, the ‘Heimspiel’ symposium, the Theater Neumarkt Zürich and the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz, Berlin. 

• KATJA MÜNKER

  © Maria Silvano

  Dancer, choreographer (D)

  After being trained and working as a physiotherapist, she studied and practiced contemporary dance, (contact) improvisation and instant composition. She has many years of experience in diverse somatic practices and was trained in the Feldenkrais method. From 2007 – 2010 she engaged in a self-organised study and research project on contemporary dance titled ‘Transploration’ accompanied by the mentors Martin Nachbar and Ingo Reulecke. Collaborations, among others, with the artists’ collective Bergrecherche, the Artistic Research Lab at Tanzfabrik Berlin and the research group ‘Ästhetische Praxis und Verkörperung’ at HZT Berlin.

  movement-muenker.de, kunst-im-gehen.de

N

• MARTIN NACHBAR

  

  Choreographer (D)

  since he graduated from the SNDO in 1996, Martin Nachbar worked as dancer and performer für companies and choreographers such as Les Ballets C. de la B., Vera Mantero, Thomas Lehmen and Meg Stuart. In 1999, Alice Chauchat, Thomas Plischke and Martin founded the collective B.D.C. Among other pieces they made ‘affects/rework’. For this, Martin reconstructed Dore Hoyer’s solo dance cycle ‘Affectos Humanos’ from 1962. Since 2004 Martin has made more than 20 dance performances. He has been closely collaborating with the dramaturge Jeroen Peeters since 2006. In 2010, Martin received a master’s degree from the Amsterdam Master of Choreography (de Theaterschool). In 2012 he created the city intervention ‘The Walk’. In 2013 he choreographs ‘Animal Dances’, a piece for five dancers on stage. 

• DR. NANAKO NAKAJIMA

  © Kanno Kentō

  Dance scholar (JP/D)

  is a dance researcher (Japan Society for the Promotion of Science/Saitama University), a certified traditional Japanese odori dancer, a Jacobs Pillow 2006 Research Fellow, a visiting scholar at Tisch School NYU 2006. Nanako works as a dramaturg in New York, Berlin, Paris, and Kyoto, her dramaturgical works include the Bessie award-winning luciana achugar’s ‘Exhausting Love at Danspace Project’ (2006) and Osamu Jareo’s ‘Thikwa plus Junkan Project’ (2008 – 2012). After she completed her dissertation on ‘Aging Body in Dance’ at Freie Universität Berlin in 2012 she organized an international dance symposium entitled as ‘Aging Body in Dance’ with Prof. Gabriele Brandstetter at Uferstudio in Berlin.

• PROF. DR. JEAN-LUC NANCY

  © Nicolas Klotz

  Philosopher (F)

  is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Strasbourg. He has been a visiting professor in Berlin, Berkeley, San Diego, Irvine, among others. Jean-Luc Nancy has published numerous books, articles, films, including ‘Being Singular Plural’ (2010), ‘Corpus’ (2008), ‘The Creation of the World or Globalization’ (2007), ‘The Ground of the Image’ (2005). He collaborated with the French choreographer Mathilde Monnier, with whom he also published a book about dance, ‘Alliterations. Conversations sur la danse’ (Galilée, 2005).

• GABRIELE NAUMANN-MAERTEN

  

  Cultural manager (D)

  studied pedagogy, extracurricular youth education and religious studies at the Universität Hannover. She was co-founder of the Theaterbüro Hannover and artistic director of the festival TanzTheater International in Hannover as well as the Internationale Sommer Theater Festival Hamburg and Festival Dance in Munich. She is a member of various national and international networks. From 2007 – 2009 she was, among others, jury member of the Capital Cultural Fund in Berlin and from 2001 – 2012 cultural attaché for performing arts at the Embassy of Canada. She directs Culture Concepts. Projects. Facilitation.

• PROF. ROBIN NELSON

  Theater scholar (UK)

  is Director of Research at the University of London, Central School, and an Emeritus Professor of Manchester Metropolitan University. He has published widely on the performing arts and media and on ‘Practice as Research’. He served on the UK national performing arts research audit panel (RAE, 2008) and is a member of the sub-panel for Music, Drama, Dance and Performing Arts (REF, 2014). His recent books include: ‘Stephen Poliakoff: on stage and screen’ (Methuen Drama, 2011) and (co-edited with Bay-Cheng, et al) ‘Mapping Intermediality in Performance’ (Amsterdam University Press, 2010). His latest book ‘Arts Pactice as Research: principles, protocols, pedagogies, resistances’ is published by Palgrave (Spring 2013).

• PROF. DR. ALVA NOË

  Philosopher (USA)

  is Professor of Philosophy at the University of California Berkeley. He is both resident philosopher of The Forsythe Company and research associate for the Motion Bank project. His research is dedicated to perception and consciousness. He is the author of ‘Out of our Heads. Why You Are Not Your Brain, and Other Lessons from the Biology of Consciousness’ (Hill and Wang 2010), ‘Action in Perception’ (MIT Press 2004; Suhrkamp 2012) and ‘Varieties of Presence’ (Harvard University Press 2012). 

• SANDRA NOETH

  Dance scholar, curator (D)

  works as a dramaturge at Tanzquartier Wien. She studied cultural, art and dance studies and is internationally active as a curator. She is the co-author of ‘Monstrum. A book on reportable portraits’ (2009, with K. Deufert and Th. Plischke) and co-editor of ‘Emerging Bodies. On the Performance of Worldmaking in Dance and Choreography’ (2011, with G. Klein) as well as of the publication series ‘Scores’ of Tanzquartier Wien (since 2010). Further publication, artistic-theoretical projects and teaching posts on the ethics and politics of the body, dramaturgy in dance and performance, alterity and otherness in the context of non-European dance and body cultures. From 2006 to 2009 she was research associate in the faculty of movement studies at the Universität Hamburg.

• DR. HANS-BERNHARD NORDHOFF

  Cultural consultant, former head of the culture department of Frankfurt a.M.

  The author was born in 1947 and studied biology, chemistry and sociology. From 1972 – 1986 cultural policy maker in Erlangen, among others, as honorary city councillor and chairman of the Stadtverband der Kulturvereine, as well as scientific assistant at the Institut für Biochemie und Mikrobiologie and from 1980 at the Institut für Gesellschaft und Wissenschaft of the Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg; 1986 – 1992 at the culture department of the City of Kassel; from 1992 – 1998 at the culture department of the City of Aachen; 1998 – 2006 head of the culture department of the City of Frankfurt am Main. Nordhoff is a founding member of the Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft Deutschlands and member of the Cultural Committee of the German Association of Cities.

• NRW LANDESBUERO TANZ

  (D)

  with its department of dance mediation, seeks to strengthen and individually implement dance art in educational, children and youth institutions. It advises interested schools, youth centres, day-care centres etc. and provides experienced dancers, choreographers and dance pedagogues. Moreover, it offers a platform for communication and advanced training and facilitates the professionalization of various cooperation partners.

  lb-tanz.de

O

• KRYSTYNA OBERMAIER

  

  Dance pedagogue (D)

  studied choreography at the Hochschule für Schauspielkunst Ernst Busch in Berlin and elementary dance at the Deutsche Sporthochschule Köln. In addition to her work as a choreographer and dance pedagogue at theatres and operas in Germany and abroad, she is a lecturer at the Universität Köln and involved in the training of certified dance pedagogues of the Deutsche Bundesverband Tanz. She is the chairwoman of

  Elementarer Tanz e.V., member of the board of the Gesellschaft für Tanzforschung and speaker of the project group Tanz und Bildung of the Gesellschaft für Tanzforschung.

• Prof. Femi Osofisan

  Theater scholar, playwright (NG)
  
  studied in Ibadan, Dakar and Paris and taught theatre and comparative literature at the University of Ibadan for 34 years, a post from which he recently retired. Osofisan’s professional experience is manifold – he is an award-winning poet, writer, actor, company director, journalist and scholar. But it is as playwright that he established his reputation, having written and produced over fifty plays, roughly half of which have been published. Among these are a series of plays which speak to Osofisan’s long-standing interest in reinterpreting European works in the context of African – specifically Yoruba – traditions and customs.

• KAITE O’REILLY

  

  Playwright, dramaturg (UK)

  Her awards include the Peggy Ramsay Award for ‘Yard’ (Bush Theatre, London), and the 2010/11 winner of The Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry for her retelling of Aeschylus’s ‘Persians’ (National Theatre Wales). ‘In Water I’m Weightless’ (National Theatre Wales) was part of the official festival at The Southbank Centre for the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Games, celebrating “crip culture”. She is a Fellow of the International Research Center ‘Interweaving performance cultures’, Freie Universität Berlin, reflecting on her work between Deaf culture and hearing culture, and ‘mainstream’ culture and disability culture.

  kaiteoreilly.com

• JANET O’SHEA

  

  Cultural theorist (USA)

  is the author of ‘At Home in the World: Bharata Natyam on the Global Stage’ (Wesleyan University Press 2007) the co-editor the ‘Routledge Dance Studies Reader’ (second edition, 2010), and a member of the editorial review board for the ‘Routledge Online Encyclopedia of Modernism’. She has published articles in ‘The Drama Review’, ‘Dance Research Journal’, and ‘Asian Theatre Journal’ as well as in numerous anthologies. She was the recipient of the Association for Asian Studies First Book Award and the Society of Dance History Scholars Selma Jeanne Cohen Award. She is Associate Professor in the department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance at the University of California, Los Angeles.