Self-Empowerment

On invitation of the Folkwang University of the Arts, Ben J. Riepe created a short choreography to be premiered at Kampnagel, Hamburg, during the Biennale Tanzausbildung 2020. For three weeks of rehearsal, the university’s dance students in their fourth academic year not only found their way into the Ben J. Riepe Company’s studio in Duesseldorf, but also explored the company’s theatrical costumes from over 14 years of production. Centred around the topic of self-empowerment, the twelve young dancers provide vivid perspectives on life and the self from a feminist, a non-binary as well as a mundane point of view, which make for a cornucopia of retrospective and prospective actions on stage.  With live-song and movement, old costumes and new texts, solo-moments and encounters, baroque as well as newly created sounds, “Ben J. Riepe x Folkwang University of the Arts“ grows into a playful palimpsest, combining old and new elements alike.

Choreography: Ben J. Riepe in collaboration with the students
Performance: Guilherme Carotenuto, Gabrielle Duval, Sarah Hesam-Zadeh,
Pin-Chen Hsu, Jan Kollenbach, Sara Koluchová, Igor Meneses Sousa, Kati
Menze, Kris Dao Nicholls, Kah Chun Pau, Lara Pilloni, Leonie Türke
Sound Design: Misagh Azimi
Project Management: Jessica Prestipino