Valeska Gert Visiting Professors since 2006

Winter Semester 2023/24 - Nora Chipaumire

Summer Semester 2023 Navtej Singh Johar

Repose to Power: Claiming the Immersive Practice of "ease"

The course will focus on the phenomenon of “ease” and is based on somatic practices that facilitate a profound experience of ease, repose pleasure and spaciousness. In the daily documentation of these practices, the students will be required to reflect not only on the processes of the practice, but also on its aftermath to facilitate a revision of perspective. The final showcase will include a devised text from the documentation alongside movement and voice phrases that would emerge in response to the suggestive practice. 

Navtej Johar's work is based on the principles of the classical Indian dance style Bharatanatyam, Physical Theater and somatic approaches. An awardee of the Sangeet Batak Academy for Contemporary Choreography, Johar links dance movement with critical theory work and social action. In his practice as a yoga teacher, he works with asana, pranayama, meditation, visualization, and Vedic chanting. In addition to his artistic practice, Johar also stands out for his political advocacy for LGBTQI* rights. The Indian law decriminalizing homosexuality, which passed the Supreme Court in the summer of 2018, bears his name.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD)

Opening
Lecture and talk
with Navtej Singh Johar
and Gabriele Brandstetter
19.05.2023, 7 pm
Freie Universität
Institut für Theaterwissenschaft
Grunewaldstr. 35
12165 Berlin
Hörsaal

Winter Semester 2022/23 – Ong Keng Sen

Performance and Agency in Decoloniality: Queering the Archive

Decoloniality or decolonialism is a school of thought which focuses on untangling the production of knowledge from a primarily Eurocentric episteme. It critiques the perceived universality and superiority of Global North knowledges and cultures.

This seminar designed for dance studies masters will concentrate on performance as agency, through strategies of queering, border thinking, and archives. Participants will focus on overcoming the present in dance and performance, with its intersectional contestations surrounding race, migration, class, sexuality, and gender. It focuses on the practice of creating unhappy archives. Final presentation will include the unpacking and sharing of each individual unhappy archive with the public, its conception, its embodiment, and its potentiality in worlds-creating.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD).

Opening
Opening lecture and talk
with Ong Keng Sen,
Gabriele Brandstetter,
Nele Hertling and
Lucia Ruprecht
27 Oct 2022, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Final presentation
with dance studies students of Freie Universität Berlin
03.02.2022, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin
Blackbox

Summer Semester 2022 – Philipp Gehmacher

Bodies in Motion:
Orientation and alignment of a relational body

In his Valeska Gert Visiting Professorship in the 2022 summer semester, Austrian choreographer, dancer, performer and visual artist Philipp Gehmacher analyses the practice of bodies in movement and their understanding of space, place, landscape and object. The aim is to explore the relational body, to share it, to open it and to make it experienceable in a performance.

In the presentation, students of dance studies at Freie Universität Berlin show the results of their seminar work with the Austrian choreographer and visiting professor Philipp Gehmacher. Using objects, images and text materials, they question their bodies in different constellations in order to explore and render the relational body tangible through performative acts and improvisation.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD)

Opening
Opening lecture and talk
with Philipp Gehmacher,
Nele Hertling,
Krassimira Kruschkova
and Lucia Ruprecht
26 Apr 2022, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Final Presentation
with dance studies students
14 Jul 2022, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Winter Semester 2021/22 – Anna Huber

In-Between Spaces – Seismographic Bodies

During her third Valeska Gert Visiting Professorship, Swiss dancer and choreographer Anna Huber explores with a focus on in-between spaces and border zones, how the choreographies of everyday life and the scores and traces of paths in public space have shifted in the current pandemic, this crisis of the corporeal. Using somatic methods (such as body-mind centring), she sensitises body consciousness and sensual perception. In dialogue with the architectures of the space, the body is experienced as an instrument of a creative process and confidence in body knowledge and environment is strengthened.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Opening
Lecture with Anna Huber,
Gabriele Brandstetter and
Nele Hertling
28 Oct 2011, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin

Final Presentation
With dance studies students
17 Jan 2022, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin

Summer Semester 2021 – Anne Collod

Disruptive Constellations – Practices of Reinterpretation

French dancer and choreographer Anne Collod was co-founder of the group Quatuor Albrecht Knust, which was dedicated to re-enactments of early modern dance in the 1990s. Significantly influenced by her later collaboration with Anna Halprin (1920 – 2021), her work today focuses on questions of utopias of the collective and of being together in different dance contexts. Together with the students, she will examine processes of choreographic recreation and explore new methods of practice in relation to Halprin’s work.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin und dem German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Opening
Opening Event with Anne Collod, Gabriele Brandstetter, Virve Sutinen, Nele Hertling
online since 18 May 2021
Akademie der Künste

Presentation
"A Journey of Objects"
Film by Mara Louise Atkins with dance studies students of Freie Universität Berlin
online since 14 July 2021
Akademie der Künste

Winter Semester 2020/21 – Toshiki Okada

How Imagination Works

For Toshiki Okada, director, author, founder and director of the chelfitch Company, Tokyo, imagination is at the heart of making theatre: “I see imagination on stage as a kind of choreographer; it is very often a genius at finding crazy movements you cannot create through theoretical thinking.” He will initially work with the students on observing how they can be affected by imagination and how it moves their bodies, and then develop this further using language and by making movements more interesting.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Opening
Lecture with Toshiki Okada, Gabriele Brandstetter, Matthias Lilienthal, Nele Hertling
2 Nov 2020, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin
Unfortunately, the event had to be cancelled.

Filmic Presentation
"Portrait of a House"
Film with Dance Studies students
online since 19 Feb 2021
Akademie der Künste

Summer Semester 2020 – Michael Laub

Adaptations – Retrospective Video Lecture

Michael Laub is a Belgian choreographer, performance artist and director. In Laub's multi-layered performances, adaptations from various media and epochs serve as a catalyst for autonomous strands that are transferred into carefully orchestrated staged pieces. By collaborating with highly-skilled artists as well as non-professionals, Laub is specifically known for crossfading his performer's reality with fiction. He has gained recognition for his adaptations of portraiture to the stage, which he acquires by making use of realism as well as consequently superimposing the spontaneous with the artificial.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Opening
Lecture with Michael Laub, Gabriele Brandstetter, Robert Gather, Nele Hertling, Miriam Schmidtke
15 Apr 2020, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Final Presentation
with dance studies students
8 Jul 2020

Winter Semester 2019/20 – Nanako Nakajima

Dance Archive Box Berlin

Nanako Nakajima is a dance scholar and dance dramaturge, and a certified traditional Japanese dance master, Kannae Fujima. Her research focuses on aging bodies in dance, archiving movement, and dance dramaturgy. Nanako Nakajima will develop her own Berlin version of the project Dance Archive Box. Among others, the project posed the question, how it is possible to separate a dance from the communal histories of the dance maker and to produce a Dance Archive Box as a creative common ground for all people.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Opening
Lecture with Nanako Nakajima, Gabriele Brandstetter, Ong Keng Sen, Nele Hertling
22 Oct 2019, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Final Presentation
with dance studies students
11 Feb 2020, 6 pm
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin

Summer Semester 2019 – Navtej Johar

Crafting Poetic Ambiance

Navtej Johar is a dancer-choreographer, scholar, yoga exponent, and a social activist. His work draws on plural vocabularies such as bharatanatyam, physical theatre, and somatics. The course will provide a working understanding of the Indian theory of bhava-rasa aesthetics and will focus on how a poetic ambiance may first be mentally constructed, calibrated and carefully designed, and then physically inhabited, experienced and expressed: If bhava is like a flower then rasa is its fragrance.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Opening
Lecture with Navtej Johar, Gabriele Brandstetter, Claudia Henne, Nele Hertling
16 Apr 2019, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Presentation
with dance studies students
25 Jun 2019, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin

Winter Semester 2018/2019 – Yasmeen Godder

Simple Action – Shared Practices

The most recent works by Israeli dancer and choreographer Yasmeen Godder evolved from the desire to open up shifting perspectives in her performances and to invite people to come closer to the physical and emotional experience while still maintaining the traditional theatre experience. During the seminar, she will create a ritual / meeting / performance with the students, inviting spectators to join without prior knowledge, and to research different methods of creating an "open door" choreography.

In cooperation with the Freie Universität Berlin and the DAAD.

Opening
Lecture with Yasmeen Godder, Gabriele Brandstetter, Sven Till, Nele Hertling
23 Oct 2018, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Presentation
with dance studies students
14 Feb 2019, 7 and 8:30 pm
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Summer Semester 2018 – Nora Amin

Performing Trauma

Writer, theatre director and choreographer Nora Amin is a founding member of the Modern Dance Theatre Company at The Cairo Opera House, director of Lamusica Independent Theatre Group and has published on theatre and human rights. Her seminar in the context of the visiting professorship will deal with dance as a medium of political resistance, transformation and healing. Together with the students, Amin will study the physicality connected to traumatic experiences and explore performative practices of representation.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and DAAD.

Opening
Lecture with Nora Amin, Gabriele Brandstetter, Thomas Engel, Nele Hertling
7 May 2018
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin

Presentation
with Nora Amin and Dance Studies students
2 July 2018, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin

Winter Semester 2017/18 – Lia Rodrigues

Being together

The Brazilian choreographer Lia Rodrigues established the residence of her world-renowed Companhia de Danças in the Favela de Maré in Rio de Janeiro. As a Guest Professor she will propose certain questions and issues that she has encountered in this specific territory: “We will work from the idea of ´being together´, using strategies of creation linked by a dramaturgical line that will be developed together with the students, articulating political, ethical and aesthetic aspects. What rituals, sacrifices, and agreements are necessary for the constitution of a collective? How can we consider the singularity in this collective? How can each participant find a place – although always provisional – and still retain her or his similarities and (gender) differences?”

Opening
Lecture and talk with Ricardo Carmone (Dance Curator HAU)
17.10.2017, 7 pm 
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10, 10557 Berlin

Summer Semester 2017 - Mette Ingvartsen

Viscous Environments

Danish choreographer and dancer Mette Ingvartsen is the guest professor for the summer semester 2017. “Together with the students I would like to think about how to create a durational environment of bodies and non-human performers interacting with one another. This desire comes from trying to unite two strands of research I have been doing over the last years: On one hand how to make objects, matters and materials agents of performative expression and on the other hand, how to understand sexuality as a social and political issue rather than a private concern.”

In cooperation with the Freie Universtität Berlin and the German Academic Exchange Service. 

Opening
Lecture and
talk with Gabriele Brandstetter
24.4.2017, 7 pm 
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin

Presentation
Viscous Environments - Longterm Performance
30.6.2017, (free) access
from 3 to 6 pm
Institut für Theaterwissenschaft of Freie Universität Berlin, DanceLab,
Grunewaldstr. 35, 12165 Berlin

Winter Semester 2016/17 - Meg Stuart

As the Valeska Gert Scholar of the fall-winter 2016/2017 I will ask the dance studies students to inform me from a personal perspective about the work and life of Valeska Gert. I will ask them what is relevant for them now about her contribution in dance and performance and how it relates and inspires their current interests. I will share my own fascination and questions about Valeska Gert and outline a creative process that spirals away from a fixed centre point allowing for associations and unusual connections with other material. Based on our discussions and collective brainstorming we will create a map of movement studies, and choreographic proposals, which we will explore to various degrees throughout our working time.

Meg Stuart

Valeska´s Blind Date
In 1994, Meg Stuart, American dancer and choreographer, founded her Damaged Goods company in Belgium. In the 2016/17 winter semester, she takes up the Valeska Gert Guest Professorship. In conversation with Annemie Vanackere (HAU Hebbel am Ufer) in the Opening Lecture she discusses aspects of her artistic development and presents her projects for her Dance Studies students. The discussion starts from the personal significance of Valeska Gert’s body of work for people today.

In cooperation with FU Berlin and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Opening Lecture
2.11.2016
7 pm 
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin

Presentation
8.2.2017
7 pm
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4
10117 Berlin

Summer Semester 2016 – Deborah Hay

Deborah Hay, born 1941 in Brooklyn/NY.

"The body is capable of so much more than what it can do. For example, the range of sound coming from the piano was more or less constant until John Cage created the prepared piano by introducing different objects that were placed between or on the strings, hammers or dampers. These outside components altered the piano’s harmonics. In a similar way the students will be given several compelling questions used to access an otherwise unnoticed bodily intelligence."

Deborah Hay

In summer 2016, New York dancer and choreographer Deborah Hay, a member of the radically experimental Judson Dance Theatre in the 1960s, takes up the Valeska Gert Guest Professorship for Dance and Performance. In conversation with Renate Graziadei (Tanzkollektiv laborgras) she offers an insight into her work and presents the project which she will be working on with her students. Introduction: Gabriele Brandstetter. In cooperation with the Institute for Theatre and Dance Studies at Freie Universität Berlin and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Opening Lecture
3.5.2016
Akademie der Künste
Pariser Platz 4, Clubraum
10117 Berlin

Presentation
1.7.2016
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10, Buchengarten
10557 Berlin

Joachim Schloemer

Winter Semester 2015/16 – Joachim Schloemer

Joachim Schloemer, born 1962 in Monheim an der Ruhr, Germany.

"Forms of musicalisation"

Choreographer and director Joachim Schloemer offers an insight into his reading of musicalisation. In conversation with Gabriele Brandstetter, he presents the project which he will be developing together with dance science students during the winter semester to explore how action on stage can be experienced and emphasised as dance, rhythm and narrative. In this process, he is focusing particularly on an idea of musicality as not just illustrating the process of dance, but rather understanding and practising the musicality of the body through movement, in dialogue or as anticyclical / counter-rhythmic to music. Which emotional states and which forms expressing feelings does this then create?
In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and the DAAD.

Introductory event
21.10.2015
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10, Clubraum
10117 Berlin

Closing event
03.02.2016
Freie Universität Berlin
Institut für Theaterwissenschaft
Hörsaal
Grunewaldstr. 35, 12165 Berlin

Summer Semester 2016 – Robyn Orlin

Robyn Orlin, born 1955 in Johannesburg, South Africa.

With her City Theatre and Dance Group, Robyn Orlin has been provoking the exploration of social issues in her home country for a number of years. She studied Dance at the Contemporary Dance School in London and has been focusing on topics such as apartheid and postcolonialism as a choreographer in South Africa since 1993. She celebrated her breakthrough in 1998 with the piece Daddy, I’ve seen this piece six times before and I still don’t know why they’re hurting each other, for which she was presented with the Lawrence Olivier Award, the most important British theatre award. She received a multitude of other prizes and awards, including the French National Order of Merit, the Ordre national du Mérite.
Her subsequent productions, for example We must eat our suckers with the wrappers on (2002), Walking next to our shoes (2009) and most recently Beauty stayed just for a moment and then returned to her start position (2013), were also substantially inspired by Orlin's home country of South Africa. Orlin has led a multitude of national and international choreography workshops (in countries such as Japan, Greece and Germany) and is the founder of the Dance Department of the Federated Union of Black Artists.
With the students of Dance Studies, she will provide insights into her artistic exploration of different cultural concepts. She will use experiences from the students' direct surroundings as impulses and stimuli for the development of their own forms of presentation, which will question the transfer of the students' own and other cultures in their boundaries.

Introductory event
29.04.2015
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg, Clubraum

Closing event
12.07.2015
Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg