Festival for contemporary dance and European dance project "Rail2Dance" moves the European Capital of Culture Chemnitz from 14 to 25 June 2023
For the ninth time now, Chemnitz will be the stage for contemporary dance in Europe in the truest sense of the word: the city will provide the backdrop for a diverse and interactive programme of international companies. Between Europark and St. Mark's Church, Off-Theatre Complex and Weltecho, Jakobi Church Square, Karl Marx Monument and railway station, ballet hall and Galerie Roter Turm, the dancers invite you to be captivated by their passion time and time again. Alongside dancers from all over Europe, Ballett Chemnitz invites you to reflect with the production "Showcase VI - HoME": About the homeland of artists who often leave home at a very young age to live their dream far from home - to dance.
The festival is rounded off with numerous workshops by international choreographers, dance parties from salsa to tango, the obligatory dance battle between young hip-hoppers and breakdancers, a daily workout with lunch in the Capital of Culture office in the Schmidtbank Passage and interventions by "Rail2Dance", a European project on mobility.
As if the festival wasn't enough for two wonderful weeks in June, the European dance project "Rail2Dance" is also making a stop in Chemnitz. Initiated by Chemnitz Theatres as lead partner, a very special project was created last year. The aim was to network contemporary dance in Europe and make it better known. What better way to achieve this than by travelling by train from the northernmost to the southernmost twin city of Chemnitz in Europe? The choice of means of transport alone is intended to convey a commitment to more environmental protection on the journey, as a train is one of the most climate-friendly means of transport.
And so these days, a group of dancers from all over Europe are boarding the train to create new perspectives in places of movement, transit, the daily commute, arriving or departing, rushing or waiting. When they suddenly turn trains and railway stations, city squares and streets into their stage, they question the meaning of communal spaces. The collective pop-up dance choreographies aim to tear us away from everyday life, at least for a moment, and take us into another world in which social codes of behaviour are broken down. The expansion of dance from the closed stage space into the public space also breaks through the wall that is often created by closed artistic creation.
"Rail2Dance" is a project by four established dance organisations in Europe: Theater Chemnitz in Germany, Tanztheater MD from Finland, PTL - Plesni Teater Ljubljana from Slovenia and Norrlandsoperan from Sweden. The project is supported by the Creative Europe Fund.
An idea from the BIDBOOK II for the European Capital of Culture 2025 will also be presented for the first time at the festival: A large "socio-cultural DANCE CENTRE" for young and old, for professionals and amateurs, for the entire urban society as a place for movement and encounters.
The planned TANZ | MODERNE | TANZ centre will focus on three main areas:
- A Central European Choreographic Centre for international residencies, research and international networking, for cooperation with the Master's degree programme in Choreography at the Palucca University of Dance Dresden, with further training opportunities for school and sports teachers, for cooperation with the TU Chemnitz for movement and work sciences.
- A performance centre for breaking as a centre for the promotion of young talent in Saxony. The background to this is that "Breaking" will celebrate its Olympic premiere in Paris in 2024.
- A TANZ der Generationen centre offers a wide range of dance activities for the entire metropolitan area in and around Chemnitz. For children and young people through to the possibility of schoolwork supervision, dance for special schools, inclusive dance, dance therapy for dementia and Alzheimer's patients as well as dance for all ages, community dance and much more. All of this is accompanied by therapeutic and medical programmes such as Pilates, Gyrotonic®, Gyrokinesis®, physiotherapy and dance medicine.
The TANZ I MODERNE I TANZ festival is one of the projects for the European Capital of Culture Chemnitz 2025 programme and Kulturhauptstadt GmbH is supporting the festival's development process.
