tanz nrw 19 – Contemporary Independent Dance Scene in North Rhine-Westphalia

At the invitation of the International Visitors Programme, a seven-person group of international guests, including festival curators and directors, one dancer and one choreographer, attended tanz nrw 19 from 8th to 12th of May 2019 in order to engage with the independent dance scene in NRW.

Tanz nrw 2019 was the seventh outing for the biennial presentation of current contemporary dance productions from in and around NRW with festival events in the cities of Bonn, Düsseldorf, Essen, Cologne, Krefeld, Münster, Viersen and Wuppertal. The guests from Brazil, Jordan, China, India, Peru, Russia and the Ukraine attended festival performances in Cologne, Düsseldorf, Bonn and Essen.

Alongside the performances, the group met with festival organisers and held discussions with representatives of the corresponding dance institutions, such as PACT Zollverein in Essen, tanzhaus nrw in Düsseldorf, the Institute for Contemporary Dance based at the Folkwang University of the Arts in Essen, Dachverband Tanz Deutschland and the German Dance Archive in Cologne.

The programme also included meetings with independent dance creatives from the NRW scene, a discussion forum on urban dance with Zekai Fenerci and Anna-Lena Werner from Renegade, Pottporus e.V., and scholars of Sprungbrett <> Tanzrecherche NRW, which is a joint collaborative project between the NRW KULTURsekretariat and tanz nrw 2019.