Dance

In times of crisis, the question of how artistic practice inscribes itself into social realities becomes particularly present. How do resistance, physical knowledge and artistic practice relate to each other and what resources are used? How are we, individually and as a group, resistant and what comes next?

The thematic week "What's the Big Deal About Resistance? - Community and Resistance in Dance and Performance" from April 13 - 17 explores the interweaving of physical and artistic practices with everyday areas of life and the possibilities of strengthening belonging and community. Workshops, performances, interventions and lectures with teachers, students and guests invite you to reflect on concepts of communal living, acting and dancing.

With Thais di Marco, Sahar Damoni, Raphael Moussa Hillebrand, Melih Kirac, Sinjini Chatterjee and others.

To the program

To the registration

SOLOEDITION'26 on Tour

This year's edition of SOLOEDITION will be on tour in April, stopping at three additional locations:

April 18, 2026 | 8:00 PM, Fabrik Heeder Krefeld | as part of the "First & Further Steps" festival

April 26, 2026 | 6:00 PM, Tanzgenerator Bonn, Theater Hall | as part of the 9th International Bonn Dance Solo Festival

April 29 & 30, 2026 | 7:00 PM, Tanzfaktur Cologne

As part of the SOLOEDITION format, students from the final year of the BA Dance program at the Centre for Contemporary Dance/Cologne University of Music and Dance offer insights into their artistic practice. Focused on deepening and advancing their own dance artistry and closely aligned with their respective profiles (Performative Practice or Dance Mediation), the students develop performative solo pieces. They are guided by mentors from the fields of choreography, dance, dramaturgy, or performance, chosen by the students according to their individual interests and focus areas.

With Solo works by: Maria Arenas Romero, Clara Böhm, Paula Castelli, Kevkev, Nadine Kribbe, Lena Luisa Röthlisberger, Jona Bo Schlotbohm

Mentoring: Jemima Rose Dean, Chien-Shun Liao, Kira Metzler, S. Rudat, Diana Salles, Sigué Sayouba, Deva Schubert

Artistic Direction: Vera Sander, Rehearsal Coordination: Kojiro Imada, Technical Direction: Marco Wehrspann

THE ORESTEIA – Collaboration between the BA Dance program & Schauspiel Köln

Close collaboration with the professional field is a central component of the BA Dance curriculum. The current collaboration with Schauspiel Köln involves ten BA Dance students into the production The Oresteia.

Australian director Adena Jacobs brings THE ORESTEIA to the stage in a version that focuses on the crimes committed against Iphigenia and Clytemnestra. What remains of the rage after the murder of daughter and mother? What of the anger that cannot be appeased by Athena’s command, “you shall not be angry, women”? Jacobs works within and around the neglected interstices of antiquity, combining drama with dance and video art to create a feminist Gesamtkunstwerk.

Director Adena Jacobs
Set and Costume Design Eugyeene Teh
Composition and Sound Design Max Lyandvert
Video Art Mario Simon and Eugyeene Teh
Choreography Melanie Lane
Lighting Design Jan Steinfatt
Sound Joschka Tschirley and Oliver Bersin
Dramaturgy Alexander Kerlin and Aaron Orzech

Clytemnestra Anja Laïs
Electra Sarah Sandeh
Chorus Julia Schubert
Agamemnon Thomas Dannemann
Cassandra Claude De Demo
Orestes Steffen Siegmund

Erinyes (BA Dance students) Evelyn Veronika Fortmeier, Matilda Behrends, Diana Alves de Oliveira, Marlene Gerber, Mara Eileen Grimm, Anouk Krämer, Katharina Lorber , Marret Schlette-Kissling, Lilly Zintl und Luise Maya Menges

Performance Dates
Saturday, March 7, 2026, 7:30 pm – Premiere
Tuesday, March 10, 2026, 7:30 pm
Saturday, March 14, 2026, 7:30 pm – followed by an audience discussion
Sunday, March 15, 2026, 6:00 pm
Friday, March 20, 2026, 7:30 pm
Thursday, April 16, 2026, 7:30 pm
Saturday, April 25, 2026, 7:30 pm
Wednesday, May 6, 2026, 7:30 pm

Further information and tickets

Open Day Dance Studies - Insights into the working and research environment of the Master’s program in Dance Studies

The Open Day in Dance Studies on April 27, 2026, from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. offers open seminars, Q&A sessions with students, doctoral candidates, and professors, a campus tour, as well as a peer-to-peer format for trying out and receiving feedback on research and ideas brought along by participants at the intersection of art and academia. Some of the events will take place in a hybrid format and/or bilingually in German and English.

Register here

Detailed Program

For further inquiries, please feel free to contact Constanze Schellow.

We are delighted that from this summer semester onwards, moving introductions will take place regularly as part of various event formats at the Cologne University of Music and Dance! Ada Sternberg, a student from the Master of Mediation in Dance , will now be supported by Beatrice Cordier (also MA Mediation in Dance), Vivienne Frey and Johanna Folz (Music Education). The moving introduction takes place before the performance and is inspired by it. It is open to anyone who wants to move and get in the mood for the evening with all their senses. No previous knowledge is required!

Dates:

• "The Breasts of Tiresias and Gianni Schicchi" April 24, 2026 Start of performance: 7:00 PM Physical Introduction: 6:00-6:30 PM, Room 114
• Mahler "Lied von der Erde" on May 6, 2026 Start of performance: 7:30 PMPhysical Introduction: 6:30-7:00 PM, Room 114
• Orchestra concert on May 23, 2026 Start of performance: 19:30 Physical Introduction: 6:30-7:00 PM, Room 114

Venue: Main building HfMT, Unter Krahnenbäumen 87, 50668 Cologne

Registration at reservierungen@hfmt-koeln.de, keyword: moving introduction + date

Our cooperation project with the online magazine tanznetz and nrw landesbuero tanz is entering the next round: from April, a new generation of MA Dance Studies students will be reporting regularly on dance premieres in and from NRW. Hannah Emami kicked things off in March with her review of the eagerly awaited new solo "HOLY SHIT - A human experience" by Ben J. Riepe at Tanzhaus NRW. Click here for the review.

The university's Equal Opportunities Commission is awarding five scholarships of 600 euros each for final theses or final projects that deal with a gender-related issue. Students of all Bachelor's and Master's degree courses can apply.

• The application deadline is May 10, 2026

The University's Equal Opportunities Commission and the Center for Contemporary Dance are awarding a research grant of € 3,000 for the Forschungskolleg Tanzwissenschaft. Funding is available for outstanding, interdisciplinary research projects with gender-related questions that work with the holdings of the German Dance Archive Cologne. Applications are open to national and international postgraduate and postdoctoral researchers.

• The application deadline is May 4, 2026

Lili Nocon and Matilda Behrends (students BA Dance) will travel to the DIALAW Festival in Toubab Dialaw (Senegal) from April 19 - 29 together with Prof. Vera Sander and Kojiro Imada. The excursion will focus on the presentation of the performance "Roaming" and active participation in an interdisciplinary studio for exchange, participation and feedback.

On site, participants will meet international and local artists, experience dance and music cultures in a direct context and participate in community-building formats in public spaces. The festival sees itself as a platform for artistic dialog and actively involves the urban community in performances, mediation formats and collaborative projects.

The excursion opens up new perspectives on artistic practice, intercultural collaboration and sustainable networks - and will be reflected on together in a workshop in Cologne afterwards.

From May 18-30, "Circus Dance Practices #1" will take place - an artistic research project lasting several weeks, initiated by CCD in collaboration with the CircusDanceFestival. Together with students of the BA Dance program, the internationally active French juggler and performer Guillaume Martinet (Compagnie DeFracto) explores artistic approaches between circus and dance, focusing on the relationship between body and object as well as between technical precision and playful experimentation. This is done through practical laboratory exercises, improvisation and compositional tools.

On May 23 & 30, the students will give an insight into the work phase in two sessions.

Dates

• "Campus session - Circus Dance Practices #1" students CCD & Guillaume Martinet / Defracto (FR) Saturday 23.5., 15.00 - 15:30 Admission free
• Location: Amphitheater Rundbühne, An der Schanz 6, 50735 Cologne, Open Air

• "Into the City - Circus Dance Practices #1" students CCD & Guillaume Martinet / Defracto (FR) Saturday 30.5., 3:00 pm
• Location: In the urban space, location to be announced

Further information and tickets

The IMPACTZONE series, initiated by the Center for Contemporary Dance (CCD) at the University of Music and Dance Cologne (HfMT), presents choreographies by international artists that are developed and performed in collaboration with students of the CCD.

Program

“Dead Slow Ahead”
Choreography: Annamari Keskinen & Ryan Mason / Thar be Dragons
Dance: María Arenas Romero, Clara Böhm, Paula Castelli, Nadine Kribbe, Lena Luisa Röthlisberger, Jona Schlotbohm, Kevkev

“Drift”

Choreography: Rafaële Giovanola
Co-Choreography: Álvaro Esteban López
Dance: Constantin Busch, Aaron Findus Fischer, Charlie Friesenhahn, Mia Haydn, Anastasiia Hulimovska, Yosep Jeon, Jeehee Kim, Stina Lisa Schnickmann, Lydia Venhoff
Music: Tiago Cerqueira

Artistic Director: Prof. Vera Sander

March 24 & 25, 2026, 7.30 PM

Concert Hall, Unter Krahnenbäumen 87

Further Information

The Federal Competition Biennale Tanzausbildung is the central platform for emerging dance talent in Germany and the most important project of the Dance Education Conference (AK|T). As part of the 10th Biennale Tanzausbildung, the graduating class of the BA Dance / CCD will present "Dead Slow Ahead" by Annamari Keskinen and Ryan Mason / Thar Be Dragons on 2 February in Berlin.

As part of the 10th Biennale Tanzausbildung 2026 in Berlin, the graduating classes of Germany’s state-recognized dance education institutions, together with invited guest institutions from abroad, will present their latest artistic works. The dance evenings at Theater an der Parkaue mark the opening of a biennale dedicated to exchange between artists, institutions, and generations—a celebration of young dance that places movement, encounter, and community at its center.

The Federal Competition Biennale Tanzausbildung is the central platform for emerging dance talent in Germany and the most important project of the Dance Education Conference (AK|T). The 10th Biennale Tanzausbildung 2026 in Berlin marks the anniversary edition and is funded by the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth (BMFSFJ). The host institution is the State Ballet School Berlin, in cooperation with Theater an der Parkaue.

Workshops and workshop projects led by Komoco, Pau Aran, Marguerite Donlon, Rémy Fichet, Liane Simmel, Nicholas Palmquist, and Marzena Sobanska, working meetings of the Dance Education Conference, and a symposium form the internal biennale program for students, teachers, workshop leaders, and guests.

On February 2nd, the graduating class of the BA Dance / CCD will present "Dead Slow Ahead" by Annamari Keskinen and Ryan Mason / Thar Be Dragons.

Dead Slow Ahead is a choreographic inquiry into slowness. The title refers to the nautical command to proceed at the minimum speed necessary to maintain course. The body is understood as a measure of temporality—carried, stretched, sensed—in contrast to acceleration and overexposure. The work asks what becomes legible when pace is reduced: how attention condenses, how perception shifts, and how care might be practiced without haste. Clear in its intention yet open in form, Dead Slow Ahead approaches slowness not as retreat, but as a different mode of steering.

In slowness, details condense through the body: the body is shaped by temporality and, in turn, shapes the perception of time. Temporal texture comes to the fore—contours sharpen, thresholds become visible; the gaze learns to wait. Calm, friction, tenderness, and doubt coexist, depending on where attention is directed. The work lingers at the intersection between the audience’s gaze and the performers’ lived temporality. Through sonic presence and sustained concentration, it invites a decelerated experience of reality.

Choreography: Annamari Keskinen & Ryan Mason / Thar Be Dragons
Dance: María Arenas Romero, Clara Böhm, Paula Castelli, Kevkev, Nadine Kribbe, Lena Luisa Röthlisberger, Jona Bo Schlotbohm

The performance is open to the public.

10th Biennale Tanzausbildung 2026 Berlin
2 & 3 February 2026 | 7:00 pm

THEATER AN DER PARKAUE
Junges Staatstheater Berlin
Parkaue 29, 10367 Berlin

Further information and tickets

From March 11–15, 2026, Tanzplattform Deutschland will present the 13 most remarkable dance productions of the past two years in Dresden. Among them are two CCD alumni: Elsa Artmann with “Langes Wochenende” and Katharina Senzenberger with “Lovedance.”

We are very pleased to see two productions by former CCD students represented at Tanzplattform Deutschland next year!

“Lovedance” by Katharina Senzenberger explores love from a queer perspective. As a counterpart to the love song, the team around Katharina Senzenberger sets out in search of a lovedance that approaches love as a moment of exhilaration. In doing so, the dance performance invites reflection on possibilities of togetherness and imagines new forms of being with one another. The choreography draws from a collective archive of affective dance forms and romantic gestures—such as the Viennese waltz and pas de deux from the entertainment industry—which are embodied and questioned by the performers.

For freelance lovers, every date is a work meeting. “Langes Wochenende” by Elsa Artmann is dedicated to professional and personal relationships. “We are concerned with how we romantically charge our work and the relationships that take place within it, especially when working under precarious conditions, and how we align our personal relationships with the logics of work, particularly where these forms begin to break down. We want to talk about collegial tenderness as a relational utopia—its beauty, its promise, its resilience, and its failure. Drawing on intimacy techniques from lap dance, we examine the corporealities of professionalized closeness and their intrusions into the private sphere.”

The dramaturgy for both pieces was developed by Valerie Wehrens, who is also connected to CCD as an alumna of the MA Dance Studies program and a former research associate. Congratulations, Elsa, Katho & Valerie!

Accreditation is now open.

Further information on Tanzplattform Deutschland

We are happy to share one of the key outcomes of the artistic research project "RELAY - Thinking Artistic Material in Music and Dance" with you: the RELAY ARTicle on Research Catalogue!

RELAY is a three year is a three-year artistic research project made possible by the ERASMUS+ program "Cooperation Partnerships". It focuses on artistic-pedagogical developments in the fields of choreography, dance, music and composition. You'll find more information about the project here.

The RELAY ARTicle shares artistic practices, pedagogical activities, documents and documentations of the process, writings, scores, methods, practical tools as well as  recollections by and about the practitioners involved in the project.

Throughout the project, we developed insights, practices, and tools around five key topics: relaying, multitude of perspectives, transformational practices, sustainability and  learning. Our findings and reflections on the principles and methods of RELAY can be explored on the page. The non-linear structure invites you to explore the material in various ways and discover multi-dimensional connections.

The ToolCloud provides access to tools, scores, and practices and invites you to use and adapt them in your own work.

Dive right in and explore!