In 2022, 4fT – Tanzplattform Leipzig (at that time still operating as 4fürTANZ e. V.) initiated a festival format at the intersection of participation and art, dialogue and performance, regionality and internationality. The festival is both an expression and a culmination of 4fT – Tanzplattform Leipzig’s ongoing commitment to the local and regional dance scene. It understands itself as a meeting place, a stage, and a laboratory at once, and addresses dance practitioners working on both amateur and professional levels as well as a broad, curious public.
ABOUT THE FESTIVAL
ANCHORING AND CURATORIAL DIVERSITY
The festival is developed in close collaboration with Leipzig-based institutions such as the Residenz (Schauspiel Leipzig), LOFFT – DAS THEATER, and Schaubühne Lindenfels. These collaborations shape both the thematic direction of the programme and its rootedness in the urban fabric. Starting from a fundamentally interdisciplinary understanding of dance, the festival actively seeks points of contact with other artistic practices as well as with different fields of knowledge and experience. At the same time, it reflects a range of aesthetic signatures and styles present in today’s dance landscape. In this way, the festival offers a multifaceted programme that presents dance in its various contemporary forms.
EXCHANGE AND MEDIATION
Drawing on the diversity of its programme, the festival brings different audiences into conversation and fosters dialogue between various parts of the urban community. Dance is not presented solely as an onstage performance, but opened up as a space of thinking and experience: it can be felt, contextualised, discussed, and collectively questioned. The aim is to make this art form accessible beyond familiar viewing habits.
RADIANCE AND REACH
The festival brings national and international artistic positions to Leipzig and, in doing so, generates impulses for the further development of local dance practice. Guest performances, workshops, and discursive formats offer insights into current currents within contemporary dance and create exchange beyond regional borders. At the same time, the festival actively builds regional and supra-regional visibility: through collaborations with partner structures such as TanzNetzDresden and by addressing audiences in other cultural centres such as Berlin, Leipzig becomes perceptible as a location for contemporary dance far beyond the city itself. This outward reach in turn strengthens the local scene within the wider German context.
STRENGTHENING AND VISIBILITY OF THE DANCE SCENE
The festival understands itself as a platform for exchange and visibility for dance practitioners working in Saxony. It creates spaces for networking and collaboration, and brings local artistic positions into contact with diverse publics. Through its supra-regional visibility, the festival makes this scene visible beyond Saxony and positions it within a national context.
ORIGINS
The first edition took place in 2022 under the title 4fT-WORKSHOPFESTIVAL. Within the framework of the funding programme “TANZPAKT RECONNECT” (DIEHL+RITTER; Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media; NEUSTART KULTUR) and with additional support from “Kulturland 2022. Sachsen als Bühne” and “Kulturstadt Leipzig 2022”, it was possible to realise an intensive programme of workshops, conversations, trainings and showings. The response was overwhelming: around 600 visitors and participants took part – a clear sign of the need for precisely this kind of shared space for encounter and learning.
In 2024, Charlie Fouchier launched TANZFORUM – Workshop and Performance Festival. From this edition onward, a close collaboration emerged with the Residenz (Schauspiel Leipzig), LOFFT – DAS THEATER and Schaubühne Lindenfels. Funded by the Cultural Office of the City of Leipzig and the Leipzig Foundation, and additionally supported through project-based funding from the Cultural Foundation of the Free State of Saxony for an invited guest performance, the festival was able for the first time to present a guest production. TANZFORUM once again generated strong attention and drew audiences not only from Leipzig, but also from cities such as Dresden and Berlin.
LOOKING AHEAD
4fT – Tanzplattform Leipzig aims to further develop this format and to position it as an indispensable voice within Germany’s dance landscape. This includes building partnerships and networks beyond the regional cultural sphere, continuously and carefully refining the quality of the programme, and engaging an increasingly diverse audience.
The next edition is planned for 30 April to 3 May 2026. In close collaboration with the Residenz (Schauspiel Leipzig), LOFFT – DAS THEATER and Schaubühne Lindenfels, this edition will once again bring together local, national and international artists in Leipzig – to research, share work, discuss and learn collectively.
2024 - Das TANZFORUM-Workshop und Performance Festival
From 3 to 6 October 2024, the Tanzplattform Leipzig will hold its second festival, the TANZFORUM, which will once again combine performances and workshops and focus on interdisciplinarity, participatory formats and the plurality of artistic and aesthetic approaches.
During the festival, the artists Vasiliki Bara, Shai Faran, Martina Hefter, Niko Jacobi, Patrice Lipeb, Yamile Navarro, Mandy Unger and Gui Yuexuan offered an exploration of their working methods. Through more than 25 hours of workshops, performances, open-floor evenings and exchange formats, which were conceived in cooperation with Tessa Theisen and Angelika Waniek from the initiative you are warmly invited and with Helena Wöflf, the festival's participants and visitors were invited to rediscover dance and performance.
This second edition of a festival by the Leipzig Dance Platform was supported by the Cultural Office of the City of Leipzig, the Leipzig Stiftung and the Cultural Foundation of the Free State of Saxony and made possible by collaborations with local and regional institutions: the Residenz (Schauspiel Leipzig), the LOFFT-DAS THEATER, TanzNetztDresden, the Schaubühne Lindenfels, and Heizhaus Leipzig.
2022 - Das 4fT-WORKSHOPFESTIVAL
In October 2022, 4fT – Tanzplattform Leipzig held its first Dance & Performance Festival. The overwhelming response and encouragement from almost 600 visitors and participants confirmed that it was precisely this kind of festival at the interface between participation and art, between discussion and performance, between openness and concentration, between regionality and internationality that filled a gap in the Saxon dance scene.