Leadership team for internationale tanzmesse nrw
Isa Köhler and Katharina Kucher will jointly take over the management of the internationale tanzmesse nrw for the editions 2022 and 2024.
Organiser nrw landesbuero tanz from Cologne selected this duo from among the applicants, who as a team have already gained experience with major international festivals at Tanz im August in Berlin, organised by HAU Hebbel am Ufer.
Prof. Klaus Schäfer and Prof. Vera Sander, board members of nrw landesbuero tanz e.V.: "After 25 years, the internationale tanzmesse nrw is and remains an important event for the contemporary dance scene. But here, too, we will take new challenges into account. The concept presented by Isa Köhler and Katharina Kucher is a forward-looking model for cooperative international and regional collaboration. Important approaches are, for example, the path to digital culture, the goal of accessibility, the importance of the local scene and sustainability. We are looking forward to the new Tanzmesse team."
The co-directors have extensive knowledge of the dance and cultural scene: in North Rhine-Westphalia, for example, Isa Köhler worked as a project manager at PACT Zollverein, Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch and the Pina Bausch Foundation, and in Berlin as production manager of the Tanz im August festival and the Dance On Ensemble. She is also part of the Advisory Committee of the International Performing Arts Network (IETM).
Katharina Kucher was most recently head of project and contract management at HAU Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin. Before that, she worked as a freelance researcher for the Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft e. V. and wrote several studies on cultural development and cultural funding. She has also worked in various theatre companies, including the Deutsches Theater in Berlin and the Schaubühne Berlin, and took on the project management of the 2014 award ceremony for artistic project spaces and initiatives in Berlin.
"We are looking forward to the task of jointly expanding the Tanzmesse as a central place for new collaborations and making outstanding artistic ideas visible. We want to make this possible by strengthening the conference character as well as by opening up new spaces, including digital ones." Isa Köhler and Katharina Kucher
New challenges: Digitalisation, diversity and distribution
The nrw landesbuero tanz is looking forward to working with the two new colleagues, who will renew the Tanzmesse with their ideas, skills, knowledge of the dance landscape and with a strong international network. Together, a future-oriented further development of internationale tanzmesse nrw will be possible - also against the background of the changing challenges to the distribution, production and presentation of contemporary dance. Digitalisation, ecological and economic sustainability, as well as accessibility, diversity and solidarity-based cooperation are topics that are currently occupying contemporary dance professionals and thus also the nrw landesbuero tanz and the internationale tanzmesse nrw.
"This is the beginning of era of Tanzmesse, which we are looking forward to with great anticipation," says Heike Lehmke, managing director of nrw landesbuero tanz.
The 14th edition of the largest international networking platform for contemporary dance will take place in Düsseldorf from 31 August - 03 September 2022. The Tanzmesse is supported by the Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia and the state capital Düsseldorf.