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Sigal Bergman (1966) was born and raised in Israel. She holds a BA in psychology from the Hebrew University, studied dance at the Rubin Academy for Music and Dance Jerusalem, Israel, and at the EEDDC in Arnhem, Holland. Sigal is a certified Alexander Technique teacher specialising in working with breath. For the past 20 years she has studied the connection between movement and thought through many disciplines, including: Alexander Technique, Yoga, Tai-Chi, release techniques and improvisation.

From 1995-2009 Sigal lived in New York City, creating her own work and collaborating with others as a dancer, she was on faculty at Movement Research, and taught at Juilliard school for performing arts. Currently she is on faculty at the ‘Hakvutza’ dance school, she teaches workshops in most major Israeli dance centres, as well as to people with Parkinson. 

From 2014-15 she was part of "Störung / Hafra'ah", a collaboration between choreographer Yasmeen Godder and Freiburg theatre that brought together scientists,dancers and people with Parkinson’s disease, to explore movement and movement disorder. Sigal creates dance and video pieces, her most recent work; Pale Fire (2016), is a duet about age and memory that premiered at Kelim Dance Centre in Israel and is currently touring.

www.hafraah.wordpress.com

Lecture by Brenda Dixon Gottschild

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Brenda Dixon Gottschild is the author of Digging the Africanist Presence in American Performance: Dance and Other Contexts (1996, 1998); Waltzing in the Dark: African American Vaudeville and Race Politics in the Swing Era (2000, 2002: winner of the 2001 Congress on Research in Dance Award for Outstanding Scholarly Dance Publication); The Black Dancing Body – A Geography from Coon to Cool (2004, 2005: winner of the 2004 de la Torre Bueno prize for scholarly excellence in dance publication); and Joan Myers Brown and The Audacious Hope of the Black Ballerina-A Biohistory of American Performance (2012).  

She received the Congress on Research in Dance Award for Outstanding Leadership in Dance Research (2008); the International Association for Blacks in Dance Outstanding Scholar Award  (2013); and a Pew Foundation for Arts and Heritage Fellowship in the Arts (2017). 

A freelance writer, consultant, performer, presenter and former consultant and writer for Dance Magazine, she is Professor Emerita of Dance Studies at Temple University. 

www.bdixongottschild.com and Facebook

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Dodzi Dougban, born in 1979, is the artistic director at the Kreativzentrum für Rhythmus und Bewegung in Vest. He is also a teacher for nonverbal communication and teaches sign language. He has been deaf since birth. His family comes from Togo and had always promoted the culture of their homeland at many festivals and concerts. In their presentations of African folklore, Dodzi was a constant part of their performances from childhood onwards. He found his own focus in dance in hip hop, modern afro and contemporary dance; he taught these techniques in courses and at schools. He was a five-time German and three-time European champion with hearing dance groups. As a dancer, choreographer, model and actor, he was involved in different video productions, television shows and dance theater pieces.

Most recently, he was on stage at the Kulturzentrum Herne and the Schaupielhaus Bochum in the piece "Es geht um Sie" in a choreography by Patricia Noworol, and he was a performer and coach in the EU project “Un-Label”. 

Lecture together with Joanne Lyons

We will give a general introduction to Candoco Dance Company, presenting on the company's values and vision, and where the company finds itself at 26 years of age. We will also discuss how Candoco came to develop the idea of Moving Beyond Inclusion and what the project aims to achieve within a European context. 

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Tanja Erhart, born in Tyrol/Austria, studied in Vienna and graduated her MA as a cultural and social anthropologist in 2012. She specialised in dance, performance and disability studies. Also she trained as a contemporary dancer with Adam Benjamin, Sonja Browne, Vera Rebl, Michael Turinsky and other artists in Vienna, Candoco Dance Company (UK) and AXIS Dance Company (USA).

In 2014 Tanja joined Candoco as a professional dancer for three years. She toured, performced and taught inclusive dance practice in countries like UK, Switzerland, South Korea, Mexico, Africa and many more.

Currently Tanja is an independent artist and scientist based in London following her interests of physical, emotional, mental well-being and understanding the interconnectedness of being an artist and a citizen of the world.

Karin Kirchhoff moderates the working group

"Disturbance / Hafra'ah הפרעה" - the two-year interdisciplinary collaboration between the choreographer Yasmeen Godder and the Freiburg Theater, which brought together professional dancers, choreographers, scientists and people with Parkinson's Syndrome to explore movement and movement disorders, is presented by Sigal Bergman and the starting point of this working group.

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Karin Kirchhoff studied German philology, art history and general linguistics in Münster/Westf. while starting to work for the Theater im Pumpenhaus and the International Dance Week Münster. In 1996 she moved to Berlin and worked for many years as a freelance production manager and dramaturg for numerous institutions and artists. These included a.o.: Berliner Festspiele, Sophiensaele, Tanzfabrik Berlin, Sasha Waltz & Guests, Jo Fabian, Rubato, Anna Huber and Canan Erek. From 2005 to 2008, she worked for Tanzbüro Berlin that was and is responsible for the improvement of the infrastructure for dance in Berlin. 

In 2008 Karin Kirchhoff became the curator for the annual dance festival Tanz! Heilbronn. The festival presents a variety of international contemporary dance productions from large companies to works by young choreographers.

Karin continues to live in Berlin and is also a guest lecturer for project financing and management.

Lecture together with Tanja Erhart

We will give a general introduction to Candoco Dance Company, presenting on the company's values and vision, and where the company finds itself at 26 years of age. We will also discuss how Candoco came to develop the idea of Moving Beyond Inclusion and what the project aims to achieve within a European context. 

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Joanne Lyons is general manager and producer of the British Candoco Dance Company and the EU-funded Moving Beyond Inclusion project. In 2009-2010 she studied at the Royal Holloway University, Egham and obtained the Postgraduate Certificate: Physical Theater for Dancers and Actors, delivered by Jasmin Vardimon Company. In 2005-2007 she studied LABAN, London. Postgraduate Certificate: Dance in Community (part-time). In 1999-2003 she studied Cambridge University, Cambridge. B.A. (Hons / Cantab) in Modern & Medieval Languages (Dutch and German).

www.candoco.co.uk

www.movingbeyondinclusion.eu

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Born in 1975 in Turin, Italy. Started dancing at the age of five, studying ballet and continuing with jazz and contemporary dance in Turin, Rome and Los Angeles. In 1996 moved to Berlin to work with Sasha Waltz & Guests. Has since been involved in the creation, performance and international touring of countless productions, films and improvisation projects and recently also started working as rehearsal director and trainer for the company. Also worked with Emio Greco/PC, Benoit Lachambre, Constanza Macras, Jeremy Wade, Meg Stuart, Peaches, Hanayo, Gianna Nannini, Julian Rosefeldt and Mike Bouchet amongst others. Won the Award for best onscreen performance at the Toronto Moving Pictures Festival of Dance in 2004.

In 2005, with Israeli choreographer and performer Matan Zamir, co-founded the duo matanicola. Their body of work so far includes seven productions, has been awarded the Kurt Jooss Prize for choreography in 2007 and has extensively performed internationally. 

www.matanicola.com

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Corinna Mindt (dance teacher and dancer). Since 2003, she has been collaborating continually with the steptext dance project. In addition to work as a dancer, she realized her own choreographies in performances and created a long-term platform for inclusive further education in dance and dance theater productions with tanzbar_bremen in 2005. In 2009, she co-curated the international festival for inclusive contemporary dance eigenARTig in Bremen; she also started teaching the workshop Zeitgenössischer Tanz trifft Gebärdensprache domestically and internationally in cooperation with the deaf dancer Doris Geist. As a dancer, she was most recently on stage and on the streets primarily with the duets Rosa sieht Rot, Bonnie & Clyde and in the pieces Hexen GmbH and SommerNacht. Together with many creative minds, she developed the model project KompeTanz; she has been active as its project director since April 2015.

Participant at the panel discussion

Different approaches and experiences to the conversation topic make this round very interesting. Susanne Quinten moderates a conversation with Tanja Erhart, Dodzu Dougban and Anna Mülter.

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The Berlin-based curator Anna Mülter works on the regular dance program and the thematical festivals at Sophiensaele and directs the annual festival Tanztage Berlin. At the same time she is part of the dramaturgical team of tanzhaus nrw in Düsseldorf where she develops a thematical focus on technical extensions of the body. After working for 9 years at HAU Berlin she was also the artistic collaborator for the international performing arts festival Theater der Welt 2014 in Mannheim. She co-curated the festival „Europoly“ for Kammerspiele München and Goethe-Institut in 2016 and the site-specific project “X Apartments” in Athens in 2015. She studied modern German literature, theatre studies and communication sciences in Berlin. 

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Susanne Quinten, Dr. Sport Sciences, comes from Germany and is presently the visiting professor in the field of music and movement for the disabled in the faculty for rehabilitation science at the TU Dortmund. She is a sports teacher, an alternative practitioner for psychotherapy and an integrative dance therapist. She studied at the Universität Mainz to become a certified sports teacher and received her doctorate at the Deutsche Sporthochschule Köln in sports psychology. She also studied elementary dance there; in addition, she also educated herself at the Fritz-Perls-Institut für Integrative Gestalttherapie/ Integrative Tanztherapie.

She was active as a dance artist with the Majy Lex dance ensemble in Cologne from 1988 to 1991. She worked in clinics as a dance therapist, operated her own private practice in Saarbrücken and was an educator, teaching therapist and supervisor. From 2010 to 2013, she was responsible for the dance/gymnastics department at the sports sciences institute at the Universität Gießen, and from 2011 to 2013 she was a research assistant in sports psychology at the sports sciences institute of the Universität Mainz.

In 2013, she was visiting professor at the TU Dortmund in the field of music and movement for the disabled. The focuses of her work include researching participation models in the context of dance and movement, mixed-abled dance, aesthetic/cultural education, and dance and body therapy.

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Lisette Reuter (graduate educator), born in Germany is a freelance cultural manager, producer, certified intercultural trainer and consultant in the field of international, intercultural and inclusive cultural projects.  She is the Director and founder of the EU wide project “Un-Label – New Grounds for inclusive Performig Arts”.

For more than 12 years she puts her professional focus on the international work within the framework of interdisciplinary cultural projects and performances. Elementary part of her professional activities, but also her personal interest is always the support of intercultural dialogue and the steerage of inclusive opening processes as well as the development of new Audience Development  strategies. 

www.un-label.eu

Lecture together with Evelyne Walser-Wohlfarter

tanzfähig will be presented by its directors as an initiative for more physical diversity in contemporary dance. In a reference to more than ten years of experience, they will first describe how the initiative’s objectives were realized in a practical sense and, second, reflect on the social position of the initiative, whereby the concept of “otherness” is cited. Third, they will consider the consequences for the self-understanding of dance that results.

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Bernhard Richarz (58), MD, is born in Freiburg (DE). Since his childhood he has been living with a disability. After studying medicine, in Munich and Berlin he practices as a medical doctor and as a psychoanalyst and he begins to dance regularly. With lessons from Alito Alessi, Adam Benjamin, Jenny Haack, matanicola, Heini Nukari et al. he procures himself an independent dance training. In 2007 he has founded tanzfähig and since 2010 he has been running the Berlin based initiative for more physical diversity in contemporary dance www.tanzfaehig.com together with Evelyne Wohlfarter. He organizes dance, as a dancer he is involved in various productions, and he teaches contemporary dance and improvisation.

www.tanzfaehig.com

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Susanne Schneider / choreographer, dance teacher & artistic director, BewegGrund

After growing up close to Bern (Switzerland) and studying therapeutic education, Susanne Schneider completed her studies in community dance at the Laban Center London in 1996. In 1998, she was the co-founder of BewegGrund in Bern and has been its artistic director since then. In addition to choreographic works for BewegGrund and other groups, Susanne Schneider regularly teaches disabled and non-disabled dancers of all age groups as well as professionals and amateurs domestically and abroad. In 2009, she completed her MA in contemporary dance at the London Contempo¬rary Dance School/Kent University on the subject of inclusive dance.

www.beweggrund.org

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Silke Schönfleisch-Backofen had originally wanted to be a doctor. Back then, they told her that she would not receive a certification due to her physical restrictions. They told her that she could go to court if she had a different opinion. She then took on the defence and chose to study law. 

She was born in Bad Soden in Taunus (with congenital diastrophic dysplasia). After studying law in Frankfurt am Main and Florida, she worked as a public prosecutor in Frankfurt/Main from 2001. Since 01.10.2012, Silke has been working fulltime as a consultant in the Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection. As a volunteer, she has been committed to the needs of people with disabilities. 

Silke began dancing in 2010. In addition to attending diverse dance workshops by Tamara McCall, Adam Benjamin, Caroline Bowditch, tanzfähig Berlin, Miguel Gutierrez, Defne Erdur, Keith Hennessy, Hana Erdman, Jassem Hindi, Zinzi Buchanan, among others, which were all focused on improvisation, she also received a Danceability Teacher Certification from Alito Alessi in 2012. One year later, she already began teaching with him at the Impuls Danceability dance festival. 2013/2014, she participated in the piece "Parkour de Danse" by Niki Meixner, Pontebba. In November 2013, in "INFloreSense", KAAOS Company, Helsinki/Finland. 2015: performance in Markus Öhrn’s Adventskalender, Volksbühne Berlin. 2016: Staatstheater Mainz Grenzenlos Kultur festival. 2017: Bondage Duell with Dasniya Sommer at the Sophiensæle.

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Katharina Senk is an Austrian dancer, performer and pedagogue based in Vienna. After graduating from MUK-University she performed for Doris Uhlich, Elio Gervasi, Anton Lachky… Gradually Katharina discovered the passion for her personal choreographic work. She started looking for ways to join her interests in psychotherapy, neuroscience and epigenetics with her knowledge from the fields of dance and movement. Katharinas pedagogical dedication lead to collaborations with the association „Ich bin O.K.“ where she was working with mixed-abilities-dancers for many years. Her Bachelor-Thesis explored the importance of inclusion within institutions of Contemporary-Dance-education in Austria. It received an award from the City of Vienna.

www.katharinasenk.com

Lecturers together with Bernhard Richarz

tanzfähig will be presented by its directors as an initiative for more physical diversity in contemporary dance. In a reference to more than ten years of experience, they will first describe how the initiative’s objectives were realized in a practical sense and, second, reflect on the social position of the initiative, whereby the concept of “otherness” is cited. Third, they will consider the consequences for the self-understanding of dance that results.

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MA in Elementary Music and Dance Pedagogic, with a specialist focus on 'Music and Dance in Social Work and Integrative Pedagogic' as well as 'Dance' at the Carl Orff Institute in Salzburg. She attended further trainings with Alito Alessi, Wolfgang Stange, Adam Benjamin, Jess Curtis, Laura Jones, matanicola in order to connect and enrich these two areas of interest. She took part in an exchange program at Dartington College of Arts (UK), where she focused on choreography and the artistic side of dance. From 2009 - 2015 Evelyne lived in Berlin, where she was teaching music and dance at various schools, alongside developing her own projects - primarily, tanzfähig. The tanzfähig initiative aims to add the dimension of physical diversity to contemporary dance. Now she lives in Austria where she brings the idea of tanzfähig to new people.

'Working with music and dance, as well as playing with personal expression, continues to open new perspectives for me. It fascinates me to discover them with children and adults. The connection of pedagogic and artistic elements is an exciting challenge.'

www.evelynewohlfarter.com

www.tanzfaehig.com

Nicola Mascia and Matan Zamir in a discussion with Ursula Schorn

When the dance teacher, dancer and Gestalt therapist Ursula Schorn and the Berlin choreographer duo Matan Zamir and Nicola Mascia (matanicola) met for the first time at the choreographic research days for and with tanzfähig in September 2016, they discovered their common interest in posing questions on diversity in dance that haven’t been answered yet.

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Matan Zamir is an Israeli Berlin based choreographer and performer. He studied dance at Kibbutz Contemporary Dance School and at Bat Dor Dance School in Tel Aviv. In 1996 he joined the prestigious Batsheva Dance Ensemble under the artistic direction of Ohad Naharin. He was invited to work with choreographer Yasmeen Godder as a creative performer, artistic collaborator and rehearsals director.

In 2002 he moved to Berlin and since then has worked with various choreographers directors and artists including Sasha Waltz, Benoit Lachambre, Michaela Casper, Kiriakos hadjiioannou, Peaches and Hanayo amongst others. In 2005, together with Italian choreographer and performer Nicola Mascia, he founded the collaborative duo matanicola. Their body of work so far includes 7 evening-length pieces, site-specific creations, festival curation, installations and improvisation projects. In 2014 together with Gal Naor he founded The progressive wave, an on going collaborative project which aims to translate complex spiritual ideas into an innovative and unique audio-visual performative language. Their 2016 debut piece "Lights & Vessels” is the first chapter in their performance trilogy "Science of Signs".

In 2016 Matan was invited to China to create a piece for D.Lab dance company in Shangha and In 2017 to Japan to collaborate with Hanayo Nakajima on a video installation at the MOT museum for contemporary art in Tokyo. Besides choreographing and performing, Matan Zamir is regularly teaching contemporary dance classes and leads movement research workshops internationally. www.matanicola.com // www.theprogressivewave.com

www.matanicola.com

www.theprogressivewave.com