We are at Work , Lightningtalks & Feedbacksessions

Alena Starostina and Ivan Nikolaev (aliveduo) will speak about what they worked on during their research residency in collaboration with Festspielhaus Hellerau and what inspired them at the initial stage of creating the performance Black Box. A work based on a play by Belarusian playwright Pavel Pryazhko explores how unresolved historical traumas continue to shape present-day life. Analog photographs of school spaces built in the 1970s–1980s, as well as documentary interviews conducted with people who studied during that period, were key materials that supported the artists in their search for an answer to the question of how architecture influences the formation of personality within the spaces of the Eastern Bloc.

aliveduo is a creative partnership between Alena Starostina and Ivan Nikolaev, who emigrated to Germany in 2022 from Russia, where they were among the leading representatives of contemporary theater. In Germany, they have continued their practice in the field of time-based media. In their projects – whether theater or film – they work with analog material, which is valued for its tactile, physical imprint of time. The latest film created by the artists, Trace of a Silent Tear, was selected for Laterale Film Festival (Italy), RPM Fest (USA), BISFF (China), and AIDFF (Athens). 

With our theme of Movement, Play and Identity, we wanted to take a look at and change perspectives on traditional role models for children. We tested, played and danced this out in closed sessions, but also in practice in a kindergarten for deaf children. The work resulted in a literal change of perspective. Rolling grandstands carry children through and into the action.

Andreas Simon and Anna Brass form a body art duo that conducts research across disciplines, ages and genres: Brass and Simon Performance Art focuses on socio-cultural projects with children and young people, professional concept performances and plays for children aged 3 and above. 

Andreas Simon studied New Dance at the School for New Dance Development, SNDO (University of the Arts) in Amsterdam.

Anna Brass is a freelance director and theatre educator. She creates theatre for and with people of all ages, both on and off stage. She studied social pedagogy at the University of Applied Sciences in Düsseldorf.

Post Paradies presents a current project: a theatre collective pitches ideas to itself and the audience for its next production, which is dedicated to the tension between the capital and the provinces. What begins as a pitch quickly turns into a musical performance in which the imagined scenic fragments of the pitched plays develop their own momentum and take on a life of their own. A theatre group in search of radical hope in times of uncertainty.

Post Paradies is a theatre collective consisting of Hannah Baumann, Pina Bergemann, Henrike Commichau, Leon Pfannenmüller and Lizzy Timmers – five theatre makers from the fields of acting, directing and dramaturgy. The group performed at and managed the Theaterhaus Jena. During this time, the theatre won numerous awards and was invited to the Berlin Theatre Meeting, among other events. After leaving Jena, they continue to work as an independent theatre collective. In 2026, they will open the Munich Kammerspiele season with ‘Danton. Ein Jubiläum.’ (AT) as part of the XZLLNZ funding programme of the FondsDaku. At the end of the year, they will premiere ‘The Pitch’ at the Hebbel am Ufer in Berlin.

Jira Duguid & Chloê Langford from the collective Fantasia Malware will give a short history of their experiences developing their own video games and performing/playing them live in front of audiences. Game systems and video game technology offer many opportunities for performativity – in this presentation we describe just a few experiences and strategies.

Fantasia Malware is an experimental video game label & collective based in Berlin. Together they make video games and performances. The members of Fantasia Malware are Jira Duguid, Chloê Langford and Gabriel Helfenstein. Their collaboration has grown out of the fizzing underbelly of video games - a late capitalist medium wrenched free from the grasp of the marketing team to make boundless alien dream worlds.

Chinese choreographer Wen Hui used the residency to conduct initial research and gather material for her new work, A City’s Story (AT). Together with media artist Remi Crépeau and dancer Patscharaporn Distakul, she explored collective narratives and the intersections between personal biographies and political events. In interviews with people aged 60 and over, she explored formative turning points in their lives and derived perspectives for current and future social issues.

Choreographer and filmmaker Wen Hui (born 1960), winner of the 2021 Goethe Medal, is considered a pioneer of contemporary dance in China. Wen Hui’s work is characterised by the body as an archive – a repository of individual and collective experiences as well as traces of intergenerational trauma. The choreographer often works on these body archives with non-professional dancers, always focusing on memories of their own lives and the connection between the personal and the political.

After studying film in Paris and New York, Rémi Crépeau worked with Mondomix (2010-2014) and produced documentaries and music content. Today, he is a freelance videographer and works with Parisian cultural institutions on historical documentaries and as a video designer for the Théâtre de la Ville, 104 and Les Rencontres d’Arles.