Daniela Contreras (Chile) - Judith Kuckart (Germany) - Itumeleng Mokgope(South Africa): three choreographers and dancers, whose lives and careers were extremely shaped by social and political changes in their countries embark on a physical and intellectual journey to scrutinize the inner self transformation. What connects us and what divides us? How does the body react to change? May it be social change, may it be aging. How has trauma influenced their works, how do they feel about reconciliation and forgiveness? How do they overcome boundaries to reveal the untold, to bridge silences, to say the unsayable?

In Johannesburg there will be workshops and improvisations with other dancers and non professionals to examine how trauma and transformation changed our perceptions and our bodies and how healing can be enhanced through the power of dance.

Daniela Contreras is a Chilean dancer. Her family exiled from Chile to the German Democratic Republic when she was a little child. At the age of 10 she came back to Chile. In 1986 she started her studies and dance training at the Conservatory of the Universidad de Chile. Today she is working as a dance teacher in her own studio in Santiago de Chile and is an active member of an organisation taking care and trying to heal traumata of children of the exile.

South African dancer Itumeleng Mokgope studied dance, classical ballet, contemporary and jazz at the Johannesburg Dance Foundation and at the Brunel University West London,Twickenham London. He won several prizes and scholarships and is working with different leading South African dance companies. Internationals perfomances took him e.g. to Egypt, Great Britain and Hungary.

Judith Kuckart is a writer and choreographer living in Berlin/Germany and Zurich/Switzerland. Having finished her studies and dance trainings she directed the dance theatre Skoronel from 1986-1998. Since 1998 she is working as a free lance choreographer. As an author Judith Kuckart is writing novels, dramas and audiobooks.
The residency of Judith Kuckart in South Africa is sponsored by Deutscher Literaturfonds e.V.

This is what Judith wrote after her stay in Johannesburg:  "Den Hund habe ich Tanz genannt" (pdf, 16 MB)

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