Holger Bergmann is a curator, mentor, and managing director of the Fonds Darstellende Künste; he lives in Berlin. He was born in 1965 in the Ruhr region. After graduating from a technical college for social pedagogy and working in so-called “social hotspots,” he studied theater studies from 1990 to 1995 at Ruhr University Bochum. He was a founding member and, from 2002 to 2014, the artistic director of the Ringlokschuppen Ruhr theater production house, which became known under his leadership for contemporary performing arts and urban, participatory projects. He has staged his own productions at independent theaters and led numerous projects with artists and artist collectives in the independent theater scene, often in collaboration with municipal and state theaters as well as international festivals (Istanbul, Tokyo, Rotterdam, Accra). He has published works and lectured at numerous universities.  Cultural Capital Commissioner for the City of Mülheim and Curator for Urban Arts Ruhr. Member of curatorial boards and juries throughout Germany and internationally. In January 2016, Holger Bergmann took over as Executive Director of the Fonds Darstellende Künste in Berlin. In 2014 and 2016, he curated several cross-city projects in Dortmund, Duisburg, and Bochum. 
In mid-2017, he co-founded DIE VIELEN, an association dedicated to cultural policy, and served as its chair until early 2025. Between 2018 and 2025, he was a member of the executive board of the Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft. Since 2021, he has been a member of the German Cultural Council’s Council of Spokespersons.
He advises municipalities, cultural institutions, and cultural policy stakeholders on development processes, such as the RUHR2010 bid for European Capital of Culture. He is currently supporting the further development of the Congress Hall on the former Nazi Party Rally Grounds in Nuremberg.

Anne Schulz studied cultural studies and aesthetic practice at the University of Hildesheim and worked from 2006-2010 as a production manager for Rimini Protokoll, Turbo Pascal and andcompany&Co. She curated X apartments on behalf of HAU Hebbel am Ufer in São Paulo (2009), Warsaw (2010) and Mannheim (2011) and worked interdisciplinary between dramaturgy, production and mediation for the festivals Foreign Affairs in Berlin (2012), Impulse in NRW (2013) and Theater der Welt in Mannheim (2014). From 2015-2020 Anne Schulz was responsible for Kammer 4 You at the Münchner Kammerspiele with a focus on participation, inclusion and diversity.

Contact
anne.schulz@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-13

Anneke Wiesner, born in Hamburg, studied German, General and Comparative Literature and Philosophy at the University of Potsdam. After working as a director's and dramaturg's assistant for several years, she worked at the Theatertreffen of the Berliner Festspiele from 2012-2022, first as an assistant and from 2016 as a consultant to the festival management. Here she coordinated (international) cooperation projects, was responsible for the supervision of cooperation partners, managed the mediation program Open Campus and worked on the design and implementation of the conference on gender (in)equality "Burning Issues Meets Theatertreffen" (2019). While working, she completed the certified continuing education courses "Cultural Management, Marketing and Communication" (2013-2014) and "Social Justice and Diversity Training" (2019-2020) at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam. From 2019-2022, she also served as an anti-discrimination officer at the Kulturveranstaltungen des Bundes in Berlin (KBB) GmbH. In 2023, she took over the administrative management of the Fonds Darstellende Künste as a parental leave substitute.

Since January 2024, she has been head of the Theaterpreis des Bundes project as a consultant for theater prizes/cultural policy and is responsible for cultural policy communication.Seit Januar 2024 leitet sie als Referentin Theaterpreise/ Kulturpolitik das Projekt Theaterpreis des Bundes und ist für kulturpolitische Kommunikation zuständig.

Contact
anneke.wiesner@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-21

Michelle Deutsch is a political and administrative scientist. Since March 2025, she has been working as a management consultant with a focus on cultural policy communication at the Fonds Darstellende Künste, where she contributes her experience in the field of strengthening democracy to cultural policy. Previously, she worked in the field of resilient democracy at the Berlin think tank “Progressives Zentrum”, where she implemented the democracy conference “Innocracy”, among other things. Her professional career includes positions in various political and social areas, including the Federal Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, NGOs and public companies. She studied public governance at the University of Münster, the University of Twente and in Seoul as well as public policy at the Hertie School in Berlin.

Contact
michelle.deutsch@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-21

Katharina Mahler has been working as a management consultant and project manager for the German Federal Theater Award at Fonds Darstellende Künste e.V. since April 2025. As a graduate media and event manager, she has experience in the development, planning and implementation of complex event formats - especially in the field of tension between political communication and culture.
Her professional career initially took her to the agency facts and fiction GmbH, where she was responsible as (senior) project manager for numerous (major) events in a political context for clients such as the Office of the Federal President, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation and various federal ministries. In recent years, she has worked as an independent project manager for cultural projects such as the FULL FORCE, splash! and MELT music festivals and the opening ceremony of the Special Olympics World Games.
In addition to her expertise in event organization, her focus is on consulting and quality assurance in project-related processes.

Christina Roth studied theater and political science as well as law in Munich and Berlin. After various assistantships, she worked as a staff member at the office of the German Cultural Council from 2005-2007 and at Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg from 2007-2008. From 2008-2014 she worked in the communication department at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt and in 2015/2016 at the office of the Bundesverband Freie Darstellende Künste. She has been working at the Fonds Darstellende Künste since 2016. She has been working there as Head of Administration and Deputy Managing Director since October 2020.

Contact
christina.roth@fonds-daku.de

Arlette Heyn, born and raised in the Black Forest, moved to Berlin after graduating from high school. Following her training as an office communications clerk and an internship at the Werkstatt der Kulturen, she worked for various film production companies as a film business manager. After further training as a financial accountant, she became self-employed as an accountant specializing in grant accounting and worked for the Yangon Film School association, among others. Prior to her employment at the Fund, she worked at Dieterich Tax Office serving businesses and non-profits. She has been an accountant at the Fonds Darstellende Künste since November 2020.

Contact
arlette.heyn@fonds-daku.de

Christina Röfer, who grew up in the Lower Rhine region, studied theater and media studies as well as German language and literature in Erlangen and completed her master's degree in staging the arts and media at the University of Hildesheim. Her theater studies focus is on figure and object theater; she designed the Theater der Zeit workbook "Der Dinge Stand. Zeitgenössisches Figuren- und Objekttheater" conceptually and editorially and has been an editorial member of the professional journal "double - Magazin für Puppen-, Figuren- und Objekttheater" since 2017. She worked as a staff member at the festival FIDENA - Figurentheater der Nationen in Bochum in the areas of production and ticketing and worked from 2016-2018 in the artistic direction of the Düsseldorf Schauspielhaus. From the end of 2018, she took over the management of the special projects CONFIGURATION, GLOBAL VILLAGE LABS and GLOBAL VILLAGE VENTURES at the Fonds Darstellende Künste and has been working as a permanent staff member and professional team coordinator in the area of funding since 2020.

Contact
christina.roefer@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-22

Robert Hartmann worked as an assistant to Matthias Lilienthal and Carena Schlewitt at the newly founded Hebbel am Ufer before studying acting direction at the Hochschule für Schauspielkunst "Ernst Busch" in Berlin. While still a student, he founded the independent group Prinzip Gonzo together with David Czesienski and Tim Tonndorf, who primarily develop game theater productions. From the beginning, Robert Hartmann has been the production manager of Prinzip Gonzo in addition to his work as a director. Most recently, he has increasingly worked as a composer of theater music. Since October 2020, Robert Hartmann has been working at the Fonds Darstellende Künste.

Contact
robert.hartmann@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-25

Anna-Sophie Lüke, born 1985 in Erfurt, studied in Jena. During and after her studies, she worked on her own projects, followed by internships as a dramaturg and assistant dramaturg at various theaters, including Schauspielhaus Hamburg, Volksbühne Berlin and Vienna's Burgtheater with directors René Pollesch and Martin Wuttke. Since 2012 she has worked as a freelance dramaturg. Recent works were "Rastplatz Marzahn" with spreeagenten Berlin and "Bahnwärter Thiel" with Büro Steinheimer. She has also worked as a project coordinator and cultural educator for the German Screenwriters Association, the Schloßtheater Celle and the Kunstmuseum Celle with Sammlung Robert Simon, among others. Anna-Sophie Lüke has been with the Fonds Darstellende Künste since October 2020.

Contact
anna-sophie.lueke@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-24

Marlene Kunath, born in Berlin and raised on the Baltic Sea in Schleswig-Holstein, studied Cultural Studies and Business Administration at the Humboldt University of Berlin with a focus on Postcolonial Theories after her voluntary cultural year at the Humboldt Forum Staff Office. This was followed by a Master's degree in Applied Cultural Studies and Cultural Semiotics at the University of Potsdam from 2018. Along the way, she worked as a student trainee at the Federal Association of the German Tourism Industry and, since the end of 2019, in various projects in the department of cultural promotion, museum services and consulting at Kulturprojekte Berlin GmbH. These included the Corona Special Grant of the Senate Department for Culture and Europe, the Call for Action #1 of the Draussenstadt initiative, and the Special Fund of the Federal Government for Cultural Events, where she was responsible for advising and reviewing funding applications, among other things. Since April 2022, Marlene Kunath has strengthened the team of the Fonds Darstellende Künste.

Contact
marlene.kunath@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-54

Mo – Do 10-11 Uhr , 15-17 Uhr | Fr 10-11 Uhr , 14-16 Uhr

Steffen Klewar studied acting at Berlin University of the Arts, having previously studied comparative literature and theater studies in Bochum and Darmstadt, among other subjects, and completed further training in theater and orchestra management at LMU Munich. He was co-founder of the theater collective copy & waste, serving as its artistic director, director, and managing director. In 2018, the collective received the Tabori Prize from the Fonds Darstellende Künste. As a freelance director, he has staged productions at municipal and state theaters such as Schauspiel Leipzig, Staatstheater Darmstadt, and Theater Oberhausen, and with copy & waste at independent (production) houses and festivals such as HAU Berlin, Ballhaus Ost, TD Berlin, Ringlokschuppen Ruhr, steirischer Herbst Graz, as well as in “non-theater spaces” such as clubs, prefabricated buildings, vineyards, and living rooms. His productions have been shown throughout the German-speaking world. He has held numerous teaching positions at HMT Rostock, HMT Leipzig, UdK Berlin, among others, and works as a consultant for institutions and individuals in the arts and culture. Since 2020, he has been program director at the Fonds Darstellende Künste.

Contact
steffen.klewar@fonds-daku.de

Anna Kondring studied Media and Cultural Studies at the University of Bremen and Staging of Arts and Media at the University of Hildesheim. As a student, she was involved in the curation and organization of theater and art festivals such as Bremer Freiheit and State of the Art, and later worked on the production of the transmediale festival 2019 and the Week of Criticism 2021, and hosted the film podcast of the Neuköllner Wolf Kino. As program coordinator at Urania Berlin, she subsequently organized countless discourse events and contributed to the supporting program of the international group exhibition "Material Nation," among other things. Since March 2023 Anna Kondring strengthens the program team of the Fonds Darstellende Künste.

Contact
anna.kondring@fonds-daku.de

Eva Stöhr, born and raised in Berlin, studied French, Music & Media and Applied Literature in Berlin and Bordeaux. From 2014 - 2022 she was dramaturg for young audiences at Theater an der Parkaue, Junges Staatstheater Berlin. There she curated festivals, labs and event series and was responsible for participatory formats with children and young people. As a dramaturg she worked with Regina Rossi, Romy Weyrauch & Marie Jordan, Leyla-Claire Rabih, cobratheater.cobra and andcompany & Co, among others. Most recently, she oversaw the focus on inclusive work and residencies by artists with disabilities. She is a founding member of the AG Junges Theater within the Dramaturgische Gesellschaft and was involved in the conception of the annual conference ,,Die Kunst der Begegnung" in June 2022 in Dresden. Since September 2022, she has been leading the new funding program for cultural education Global Village Kids within the framework of Kultur macht stark. Alliances for Education funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.

Contact
eva.stoehr@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-52

Björn Frers studied theater, philosophy, journalism and communication science at the Freie Universität (FU) Berlin. This was followed by positions in dramaturgy at the Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz, at the DFG project "The Imaginary in Artistic Performances" at the FU Berlin, and freelance work in the PR field. In 2010 he founded the agency for cultural management björn & björn - Presse, Produktion & Dramaturgie with his partner Björn Pätz. Here he accompanied artists and their projects, festivals and venues of the independent performing arts in the areas of production management as well as press and public relations for ten years. In January 2019, he took over as head of communications for LAFT - Landesverband freie darstellende Künste Berlin and its projects such as the Performing Arts Program and Performing Arts Festival Berlin.

Since October 2020, he has been working for Fonds Darstellende Künste as part of NEUSTART KULTUR.

Contact
bjoern.frers@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-33

Anne John, born and raised in Märkisch-Oderland, studied Romance languages and literature and German Studies at the University of Leipzig. In 2014-2017 she worked at the International Theatre Institute (ITI), primarily as a production manager. She supervised several international symposia, the conference "Theatre in Contemporary Europe" (2016 Hildesheim) and two awards of the "Theaterpreis des Bundes" (2015 Berlin | 2017 Stendal). In addition, she coordinated the production of publications, such as "Das Freie Theater im Europa der Gegenwart" (Bielefeld dt. 2016 |engl. 2017), which presents the research results of the Balzan Prize research project headed by Prof. Dr. Manfred Brauneck. In 2017, she supervised events in the series "Tanz medial" (Berlin | Leipzig) for the umbrella organization Tanz Deutschland and headed the editorial team of the publication "Tanzland-Reader". This was followed in 2018 by a research project for the Bundesverband Freie Darstellende Künste on continuing education opportunities in the independent performing arts. Since 2015, she has also worked for the Initiative for the Archives of Free Theater, in whose study "Performing the Archive" (Hildesheim 2018) she contributed and for which she organized, among other things, the conception conference (2017 | Munich) and workshops (Cologne | Düsseldorf | Hamburg). Since 2018 she has been working for the Fonds in the field of event management and public relations.

Contact
kommunikation@fonds-daku.de
030 6293126-30