On 27 October 2022, our long-time collaborator Matthias Burkert passed away in Wuppertal. For more than four decades, his work and his presence as a human being shaped the Tanztheater Wuppertal and Pina Bausch’s pieces. 

We have lost a valued colleague who, through his musical work, his playful and sometimes experimental approach to music and improvisation, and his sensitivity towards artistic processes, left an indelible mark on the work of the ensemble. We mourn the death of Matthias Burkert.

In silent gratitude,

the ensemble of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch

Matthias Burkert was born in Duisburg in 1953. He finished school in Wuppertal in 1972 and went on to study piano, trumpet and singing at the Wuppertal campus of the Cologne Music Academy. Following his graduation in 1978, he took up a teaching position at his university. Two years previously, in 1976, he had become music director of Wuppertal’s theatre for children and young people. When he saw Pina Bausch’s work for the first time, he was deeply impressed. In 1979, she asked him to become part of her Tanztheater, drawing on his love for improvisation and extensive musical knowledge. Working closely with Pina Bausch, Burkert influenced the Tanztheater in important ways and even appeared on stage in some pieces. Since 1995, Burkert has been sharing the responsibility for the musical direction of the Tanztheater with Andreas Eisenschneider. From the very beginning, Burkert attended rehearsals, noted down the questions that Bausch posed to her dancers and collected many different pieces of music for each individual dance. As Pina Bausch used to say, the final choice would depend on which piece of music still sounded fresh and new after many times of hearing it: “In twenty years, we still have to look forward to what comes next.” Moments of silence were equally important. It had to be a ‘healthy silence’, where the energy of the piece continued to resonate, not merely a moment without music.

Norbert Servos

On January 21, we celebrate the premiere of the triple bill evening Café Müller | common ground[s] | The Rite of Sprine at the Opernhaus Wuppertal. This first joint evening of the Pina Bausch Foundation and Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch in January 2023 is a contribution to the preparation of the Pina Bausch Centre and is funded as part of the preliminary phase of the Pina Bausch Centre by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, the Ministry of Culture and Science of the German State of North Rhine-Westphalia and the City of Wuppertal, as well as by the Arts Foundation of North Rhine-Westphalia and the Stadtsparkasse Wuppertal.

Performance dates January 21, 22, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29

Tickets are available now, Ticket hotline +49 (0)202 563 7666 or at Kulturkarte Wuppertal, Kirchplatz 1, 42103 Wuppertal.

more info here

The Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch’s 2023 photo calendar is now out! It features photographs by the Berlin-based photographer Oliver Look and, for the first time, a fold-out calendar section.

Format 50 x 39 cm, silk-matt finish, 25 euros, available from the Tanztheater Wuppertal’s merchandise stall at the Wuppertal Opera House. On performance nights it opens one hour before the performance (21, 23, 24, 25 September Água / 10, 11, 12, 13 November Kontakthof / 18, 19, 20 November Full Moon … for future dates, visit pina-bausch.de). From 26 September 2022, the calendar will also be available from Kulturkarte in Wuppertal: Kirchplatz 1, 42103 Wuppertal
 
13 full-colour photographs by Oliver Look of pieces by Pina Bausch:

•    He Takes Her By The Hand And Leads Her Into The Castle, The Others Follow
•    Arias
•    Palermo Palermo
•    „…como el musguito en la piedra, ay si, si, si…“
•    Bluebeard. While Listening to a Tape Recording of Béla Bartók´s opera “Duke Bluebeard´s Castle”
•    Kontakthof
•    Orpheus und Eurydike
•    Carnations
•    ‘Sweet Mambo’
•    The Piece with the Ship
•    Palermo Palermo

The exhibition Senga Nengudi at the Von der Heydt-Museum in collaboration with the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch opens on August 21. The American artist Senga Nengudi (born in Chicago in 1943) studied both dance and sculpture in Los Angeles in the early 1960s and continues to combine movement and sculpture in her works today, often in surprising ways.

On 21.8., 25.9., 23.10., 27.11., 18.12. and 15.01. at 3pm, Senga Nengudi invites dancers from the ensemble and the musician Justyna Niżnik to engage in an intensive, free-flowing improvisatory process to explore the strange and unusual materials she uses for her sculptures.

Further information here

The official podcast of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch.

Season 1

Why do we dance?

In this first season, Marc Wagenbach spoke with dancers, staff, and guest artists of the Tanztheater about Pina Bausch, dance as an art and form of expression, backstage secrets, the role of art in social and political debates, personal stories, the past, the present, and the future.

Süß und Sauer mit Bettina Wagner-Bergelt

Sweet and Sour - with Bettina Wagner-Bergelt

Gestrandet an der Wupper - mit Barbara Kaufmann

Stranded on the Shores of the Wupper - with Julie Anne Stanzak

Stranded on the Shores of the Wupper Part II - with Saar Magal

Warten auf den Weihnachtsmann - Weihnachtsspecial mit Roger Christmann

Waiting for Santa - Christmas Special with Oleg Stepanov

Me, Myself and I - with Julie Shanahan

Approaching Anna - with Stephanie Troyak

Being on a journay - with Dean Biosca

In the moment - with Christopher Tandy

How to shine? From gardening, dancing and healing bodies - with Bernd Uwe Marszan

Wand an Wand - mit Çağdaş Ermis

to the episodes on Spotify

to the episodes on Apple Podcasts

@tanztheaterwuppertal

@tanztheaterwuppertalcreate