TANZFORUM – Workshop- und Performance-Festival 2026
Über das Festival
Vom 1. bis 3. Mai 2026 lädt 4fT – Tanzplattform Leipzig zum dritten Mal zu einem Festival ein, das sich dem zeitgenössischen Tanz und der Performance widmet. Das Festival TANZFORUM versteht sich als Ort an der Schnittstelle von Kunst und Teilhabe: Neben Bühnenformaten ist das Publikum eingeladen, künstlerische Arbeitsprozesse auch in Workshops und öffentlichen Gesprächen kennenzulernen.
Das Festival präsentiert Künstler:innen mit vielfältigen ästhetischen Ansätzen. Mit Beiträgen aus zeitgenössischem Tanz, Hip-Hop und Performance sowie Formaten, die aus einem Dialog zwischen Musik und Tanz hervorgehen, entsteht ein facettenreiches Programm unterschiedlicher künstlerischer Ausdrucksformen.
Alle Informationen zur Veranstaltung finden sich auf der Website des Festivals: www.tanzforum-leipzig.de
Doppelabend junger Tanz
In dieser Ausgabe legt das Festival mit einem Doppelabend junger Tanz einen besonderen Schwerpunkt auf Intergenerationalität. Zwei Performances von und mit Jugendlichen geben Einblick in ihre eigenen Ausdrucksformen, Themen und Perspektiven. Wie blicken junge Menschen auf Tanz – und was möchten sie durch Bewegung, Stimme und Musik erzählen? Zwischen urbanen und zeitgenössischen Tanzsprachen, musikalischer Arbeit und choreografischer Recherche entsteht ein vielfältiger Abend, der unterschiedliche Stile miteinander verbindet und jungen Stimmen Raum gibt.
Videoinstallation im Rahmen des Spinnerei-Rundgangs
Anlässlich des Spinnerei-Rundgangs am 25. und 26. April präsentiert das Festival in der Residenz (Schauspiel Leipzig) eine frei zugängliche Videoinstallation. Anhand von Videobeiträgen gewährt sie Einblick in die kommende Ausgabe: Gezeigt werden Arbeiten im Zusammenhang mit den angekündigten Performances, frühere Werke der beteiligten Künstler:innen sowie ein kurzer Dokumentarfilm zu vergangenen Festivalausgaben.
Das TANZFORUM – Workshop- und Performance-Festival 2026 ist ein Projekt von 4fT - Tanzplattform Leipzig e. V., in Kooperation mit dem LOFFT-DAS THEATER und der Residenz (Schauspiel Leipzig).
"INSIDE/OUT – Tanz, Stimme & Community" ist ein Projekt von 4fT - Tanzplattform Leipzig, in Kooperation mit LOFFT-DAS THEATER und RAA Leipzig. Die Veranstaltung wird gefördert von ChanceTanz, einem Projekt von „Aktion Tanz - Bundesverband Tanz in Bildung und Gesellschaft e. V.“ im Rahmen des Programms „Kultur macht stark. Bündnisse für Bildung“ des BMBFSFJ.
Die Juniorcompany der Älteren ist Teil des Ausbildungsprogramms des Leipziger Tanztheaters.
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.
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.