The three theory curators bring different perspectives to the table: in addition to a choreographic-analytical approach, a pop-culture outlook critical of society and a queer/feminist perspective are increasingly taken into account as well. Some of the theory programme is thematically linked with TQW’s performance programme, but besides that it also investigates essential issues in the fields of choreography and performance, or, more generally, major concerns of our time.
Thomas Edlinger, born in 1967 in Vienna, is a radio broadcaster, freelance arts and culture journalist, curator and author of books. Together with Fritz Ostermayer, Edlinger has been producing and presenting the FM4 radio show Im Sumpf since 1995. He held a post as curator at the O.K. Centre for Contemporary Art in Linz from 2002 to 2004 and at LENTOS Art Museum Linz from 2004 to 2006. In 2015, he published the essay Der wunde Punkt. Vom Unbehagen an der Kritik. He has been artistic director of the donaufestival in Krems since 2017. Edlinger teaches in the Department of Art and Knowledge Transfer at the University of Applied Arts Vienna.
Janez Janša, born in 1964 as Emil Hrvatin, is a Slovenian performance artist and theorist. He edited and published Maska, a bilingual (English/Slovenian) performative arts magazine, and was director of an institute of the same name for publication, production and education from 1999 to 2006. He has presented many performative and installative projects and given lectures in many parts of the world since the early 1990s.
Janine Jembere is an artist and currently a participant in the “PhD in Practice” programme at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. In addition to that she is involved in an international research project on the topic of “land and dispossession”. In her artistic work and research, she concentrates on resonances of somatic knowledge, sensory hierarchies, ableism, race and gender. Her works include videos, sound works, performances, plays, and installations. Jembere held a scholarship at Akademie Schloss Solitude, Berliner Senat and Fleetstreet Theater Hamburg, among others. Her works have been in shown in Europe and beyond.
The lab programme regularly held at the TQW Studios is dedicated to exploration and exchange between local as well as international artists and experts. Unhampered by the customary pressure to produce and present, the participants can explore general topical, specific or utterly unusual aspects of contemporary choreography and performance. Some of the subjects addressed relate to the contemporaneous performance programme at Tanzquartier Wien to enable a closer examination. However, the labs also provide those interested with a platform to inquire into urgent issues of our time, irrespective of TQW’s programme. Experts or artists curate and run the labs.
Imagining otherwise – Invention of the present (Research series)
“I turn to the black hole of the theatre as a space […] to negotiate the past in order to make another future possible.” – Ligia Lewis
For generations, performance artists have imagined different ways of representing social conditions and movements and have created utopian and dystopian worlds, but always in the knowledge that the actions on stage do not simply mirror but also shape the present.
The research series Imagining otherwise – Invention of the present takes a close look at contemporary and historical artistic strategies that were successful in inventing and changing the idea of the present. This series combines the fields of research, choreography and performance as a means of subverting political debates and overcoming social injustice, instead of reproducing it. Inspired and influenced by current debates on anti-racism and post-colonialism, transformative strategies will be developed and tested on the basis of the interplay between different artistic and theoretical approaches.
In November, Tonica Hunter will explore an aesthetics of resistance in order to create alternative spaces and communities through her art. In January, based on their performance Make Banana Cry, Andrew Tay and Stephen Thompson will develop performative strategies that will subvert the power structures of the art world. In March, the lab research into the artistic biography of choreographer Nyota Inyoka will inform a new post- and decolonial theory and practice. This special lab session will be part of a collaboration between the Centre National de la Danse in Paris and the Department of Music and Dance Studies at the University of Salzburg. Finally, in April, Ligia Lewis will raise questions concerning the representation of Blackness in theatre, based on her new ensemble piece Still Not Still. In all our artistic labs, small groups of local artists, theorists, activists, cultural workers and others will work for an entire week without any pressure and without the expectation of a final product.
In consultation with the artists, the research output will be made available in different forms (texts, videos or live events).
The reference library in the TQW Studios comprises a unique collection specialising in contemporary dance and performance. The well-stocked inventory, which is the core of the library, comprises over 2,600 titles and 2,100 magazines.
The foyer area accommodates general literature and anthologies on the subjects of dance, performance, art, theory and more, including subject-specific works from the fields of gender theory and philosophy. A comfortable, publicly accessible room for reading, researching and riffling is located on the first floor under the roof. A computer workstation is provided to browse the complete digitised archive of live performance recordings, lectures and labs held since the opening of TQW in 2001.
Moreover, a regularly updated selection of books, articles and videos related to the performance programme is available here to read up on or preview.
In the exhibition area we present a monthly changing program that is selcted from our archive. It communicates with the stage program.
