After training as an actress in Munich and many years on stage, her love of directing and managing her own projects took over. Stations as assistant director and production manager for musical theater at home and abroad followed. 2013 foundation of the theater label WIR.Jetzt! In 2015, the first theater piece "Talk Talk- Journey Without Escape" was created, an adaptation of the novel Talk Talk by T.C.Boyle for WIR.Jetzt! In 2017 followed a new adaptation of the fairy tale "Der Gestiefelte Kater" for Theater und Philharmonie Thüringen. In 2018, an adaptation of the myths surrounding the Flying Dutchman. The production "Der Fliegende Holländer" for the Klang! Festival Bielefeld was awarded the Förderpreis Klassik. Production management and dramaturgy for theater projects in urban areas followed, as well as artistic direction of the Theaterhaus TiG7 in Mannheim. 2010 to present as freelance director for drama and cross-discipline projects. Since February 2021 Managing Director of the Bad Hersfeld Festival.

Fatima Çalışkan is a moderator, artist and author. Her focus is on art and cultural policy issues on which she writes analyses and essays, among others for the Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft, or develops satirical texts for independent productions. She is co-founder and co-editor of the biennial magazine YallahSalon. As a presenter, she plays the entire keyboard of conversation and presentation formats for stage, audio and video. As a performer and dramaturge, she collaborates with various projects in the independent scene. Other positions include advising and accompanying projects for the Interkultur Ruhr funding fund, co-directing the advisory office of the Performing Arts Program of the LAFT Berlin, co-directing the FAIRSTAGE model project, and jury activities at the federal and state levels.

Dorte Lena Eilers is professor and head of the master's program "Cultural Journalism" at the University of Music and Theater in Munich in cooperation with the August Everding Theater Academy. She also works as a cultural journalist, predominantly in the fields of music and theater against the background of socio-political developments. Previously, she was editor from 2007 to 2021, most recently editor-in-chief of Theater der Zeit. She is a member of the German Academy of Performing Arts and the advisory board of the magazine "junge bühne" and has served on various juries (including the German Federal Theater Prize and the Mülheim Theater Days). Publications (as co-editor) include Frank Castorf, Dimiter Gotscheff, Bulgarian theater and new German-language drama. Most recently, her volume of talks "backstage TSCHEPLANOWA" was published.

Yunus Ersoy, who grew up in Zurich, is a dramaturg*. After completing a BA, Yunus studied for an MA at the University of Zurich (Cultural Analysis) and Applied Theater Studies in Giessen.

In 2009 Ersoy was a founding member of "oimoi - junges theater zürich", is still a member of the board of directors, and has been involved in over 10 oimoi productions on and off stage. At the Schauspielhaus Zürich, Ersoy has been part of choruses in plays by René Pollesch, among others.

Ersoy organizes festivals (including Queer Week in 2021-2023) and has performed own works with the collective Mora Vegesture at Künstlerhaus Mousonturm, with Camila Rhodi at the FACT Festival in Budapest, and with Josef Mehling at 48h Neukölln in Berlin. In 2020, Jil Dreyer, Ersoy and Mehling presented the theater performance None of This at the Grätsche Festival in Zurich.

After an internship at Studio Я, Ersoy worked as an assistant and then as a dramaturg at the Maxim Gorki Theater in Berlin since the middle of the 2018/19 season, working with directors Yael Ronen, Hakan Savaş Mican, and Paul Spittler, among others.

In the 2023/24 season, Ersoy will work as a dramaturg* at the Schauspielhaus Zürich with Suna Gürler and Joana Tischkau.

Sabine Gehm is artistic director of the international festival TANZ Bremen and in the management team of the Tanzpakt project 'MV tanzt an'.

From 2006 to 2016, together with Katharina von Wilcke, she directed the first four editions of the international dance congress of the German Federal Cultural Foundation (Berlin 2006, Hamburg 2009, Düsseldorf 2013, Hannover 2016).

A graduate in cultural studies, she was program dramaturg and director of various festivals (including Junge Hunde, Independance Days, Tanzplattform Deutschland 2000) at Kampnagel Hamburg from 1994 to 2001 and coordinated, among other things, the international performing arts network 'Junge Hunde', which she co-founded, from 2001 to 2005.

Before that, she worked as an organization manager at the International Summer Theater Festival Hamburg.

As a freelance curator and cultural manager, she conceived and was responsible for international exchange projects, think tanks, laboratories and academies for KSB, BFDK, DTD, among others. She is on the board of the Dachverband Tanz Deutschland and was chair of the board of trustees at the Fonds Darstellende Künste from 2015 to 2020, for which she led the decision-making processes in 2020 (including publication of the handout on jury procedures). She is active as a reviewer and member of various juries of nationwide and international programs and works as a mentor in an advisory capacity for various artists and projects.

Martina Grohmann, born in Mödling near Vienna, studied theater at the University of Vienna. She began as a production manager at steirischer herbst in '98 and '99. From 2000 on, she was engaged as a dramaturg at Staatstheater Kassel, at LTT Tübingen, at Theater Heidelberg, where she directed the venue zwinger1 for author's theater and projects from 2005 to 2007, and at Theater Basel. She has also worked as a guest dramaturge at the Schaubühne Berlin and the Schauspiel Frankfurt. Her work focuses on contemporary drama, play development, and interdisciplinary formats and festivals. Since August 2013, she has been the artistic director of Theater Rampe together with Marie Bues.

The Fonds was shocked and saddened to learn of the death of Bea Kießlinger. She represented the Dachverband Tanz in the Fonds Darstellende Künste on many occasions. We will always remember her dedicated work for dance and especially for the independent dancers and choreographers. An obituary for Bea Kießlinger appeared in the Stuttgarter Zeitung.

Bea Kießlinger studied architecture and taught at the TU Stuttgart on the subject of movement and space. In her work, she has focused on contemporary dance for many years, as managing director of cultural institutions, networker, artistic project manager, curator, dramaturg, juror and advocate. She directed Tanz- und Theaterwerkstatt e.V. Ludwigsburg from 1998 to 2007, was a member of the management team of Tanzplattform Deutschland in Stuttgart in 2006, and worked at Theaterhaus Stuttgart as artistic director. In 2009, she founded the state-wide network "TanzSzene BW," on whose board she is still active today. For the umbrella organization Tanz Deutschland, Bea Kießlinger was involved in the board from 2010 to 2017, is a member of the initiative group Stadt-Land-Bund, and has led the cultural policy dialogue in the funding program TANZPAKT Stadt Land Bund since 2017. For the umbrella organization Tanz, she is also charged with maintaining regular cultural-political exchange with other associations such as the German Cultural Council, the Alliance of the Liberal Arts, and the Action Alliance for the Performing Arts, and with further developing dance topics in terms of content.

Marcus Lobbes has been working as a director, set designer and writer in music and spoken theater since 1995. He is also the director of the Academy for Theater and Digitality, the newly founded sixth division at Theater Dortmund in 2019. He has worked, among others with a focus on premieres and first performances, at many renowned drama and opera houses (e.g. Schauspiel Düsseldorf, Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Nationaltheater Mannheim, state theaters in Kassel, Mainz, Saarbrücken, Darmstadt and Braunschweig, Schauspiel Dortmund, Wuppertaler Bühnen, Theater Freiburg and many others). Novel collective work forms with the ensembles as well as his close contact to contemporary authors and composers characterize his artistic work. Since 2014, he has been regularly invited as a guest lecturer at various renowned colleges and universities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. As director of the Dortmund Academy, he is in demand locally, nationally and internationally in lecture and discourse formats; an important concern for him is the formation and promotion of a wide variety of networks for the performing arts as well as the communication of artistic research in correspondence with the latest technologies to theater and educational institutions, politics and the public.

After studying Applied Theater Studies in Giessen, Bettina Masuch worked as a dramaturg at the Volksbühne in Berlin, among other places, where she collaborated on productions by Frank Castorf, Christoph Schlingensief and Rene Pollesch. At HAU she was curator for dance and performance from 2003 to 2008. After leading positions at the Springdance Festival Utrecht and the Berlin dance festival Tanz im August, she took over the directorship of tanzhaus nrw in Düsseldorf in January 2014.

Lara-Sophie Milagro, Berlin, studied acting in London and New York and singing in Berlin. She has performed at the Staatstheater Mainz, Theater Kassel, Gorki Theater Berlin, Residenztheater Munich and at the Münchner Kammerspiele. Collaboration with directors such as Frank Patrick Steckl, Antoine Uitdehaag and Julia Wissert. As a writer / director she wrote / directed "Heimat, bittersweet Heimat" (Ballhaus Naunynstrasse '11), "Satoe" (Nationaltheater Mannheim '13), "Dauerkolonie Berlin" (Ballhaus Naunynstrasse, '18), "Winterzeit (HAU Berlin, '18), "Auf Noahs blutigem Regenbogen tanzen wir" (Gorki Theater Berlin, '20) and participated in all these productions also as an actress. She has also appeared in numerous film and television productions, including Tatort Weimar (ARD '17), "Dogs of Berlin" (Netflix '18) and the TV multi-part "Das Geheimnis des Totenwaldes" (ARD, '20) alongside Matthias Brandt and Karoline Schuch. She is also a voice actress, most recently for the Netflix production "His House" ('20) and the Arte film "Les Heritieres" ('21). From 2018-2021, she also wrote the monthly column "Heimatgeschichten" for nachtkritik.de. In 2022, the theater film "Emmett, tief in meinem Herzen" will be released (premiered at Hebbel Theater Berlin), in which Lara-Sophie Milagro participated as an actress, director and producer.

In addition to her work as Artistic Co-Director of Ballhaus Ost, Tina Pfurr works as a curator, performer, actress and speaker and also develops her own projects. Pfurr has been a board member of LAFT Berlin since 2017 and is a regular member of award and festival juries (including 2017-2020 Kulturbehörde Hamburg; 2021 Körber Stiftung Junge Regie). Most recently she realized the performance I just called to say... sHe's dead. which was published online as a 5-part video work in February 2021. Since 2014, she has toured the world with the dance karaoke performance copy & dance. Pfurr also produces video works, the two video essays Applied AXXXD-Gendering (2017) and SelfFanfic - An Exorcism (2019) have been shown at various festivals. In recent years she has worked in various theaters, worldwide, as a performer and actress and conceives performative moderations. In addition to her theater work, she is also an actress for film and television.

Gregor Runge, born in Dresden, studied theater studies and comparative literature in Bochum and worked for the Impulse and FAVORITEN theater festivals, among others. From 2011 he worked as a dramaturg primarily with Samir Akika/Unusual Symptoms and the Theater im Pumpenhaus Münster. In 2012 he went to Theater Bremen as dramaturg. In 2015 and 2017 he co-directed the international performing arts festival OUTNOW! in cooperation with Schwankhalle Bremen. He has worked on projects for the Goethe-Institut in Novosibirsk and for the Goethe-Institut Ukraine. Since the 2018/2019 season, he has been co-directing the dance division of Theater Bremen with the company Unusual Symptoms together with Alexandra Morales. Under their co-direction, productions with internationally renowned choreographers such as Faye Driscoll, Adrienn Hód, Máté Mészáros and Núria Guiu Sagarra are created alongside the work of house choreographer Samir Akika. Two of the works created since then were invited to the Tanzplattform Deutschland in 2020. Gregor Runge is a regular member of various juries, including the board of trustees of the Fonds Darstellende Künste from 2018 - 2021 and for the state of NRW. In addition, he initiated and is responsible for the concert series Theater Bremen CLUB, which regularly presents artists* from the global jazz and pop landscape for the first time in Bremen.

Martin Jörg Schäfer has been teaching theater research at the University of Hamburg since 2014. He is currently researching processually and collaboratively generated text forms in contemporary theater and performance, as well as theater and performance manuscripts in the sign of digitalization. 2014-2021 Co-director of the MA Performance Studies at the University of Hamburg. 2014 Co-organizer of the geheimagentur-initiated congress "The Art of Being Many" at Kampnagel. Since 2015 co-curator of the "DachSalon" series of talks on theater and politics at the Hamburg Schauspielhaus. For the seasons 2016/17 to 2019/20 member of the jury of the Hamburg Authority for Culture and Media for the funding of projects of the independent performing arts in the field of spoken theater/music theater/performance as well as in the overarching promotion of new talent and concepts. 2017 Leadership team of the annual conference of Performance Studies international "OverFlow" at Kampnagel as part of "Theater der Welt". Since 2020 member of the jury for the Start Off Prize of the Lichthof Theater and the Hamburg Kulturstiftung.

Carena Schlewitt was born in Leipzig in 1961. Since 2018, she has been the artistic director of HELLERAU - European Center for the Arts in Dresden.

She was Director of Kaserne Basel from 2008-2018 and Artistic Director of the Basel International Theater Festival (since 2012). She studied theater at the Humboldt University in Berlin and worked at the Academy of Arts in East Berlin from 1985 to 1993. She worked as dramaturge, curator and deputy artistic director at various independent production houses (Podewil Berlin; FFT Düsseldorf; HAU Berlin) and at international festivals (Theater der Welt; HAU Berlin).

The focal points of her work have included the transformation processes in East Germany, Eastern Europe and China and the development of theater in Poland, France and Italy as well as live art and performance art. She has served on various juries, including for the "Impulse" festival; for the German-Polish expert panel of the Kulturstiftung des Bundes as well as for the "Doppelpass" program of the Kulturstiftung des Bundes; she was a member of the expert commission of the Swiss cultural foundation Pro Helvetia.

Carena Schlewitt is a member of the Saxon Academy of Arts, the Saxon Cultural Senate and a member of the Expert Advisory Board for Performing Arts and Music at the Cultural Foundation of the Free State of Saxony.

Matthias Schulze-Kraft is the artistic director of the LICHTHOF Theater, a venue and production center for independent theater in Hamburg. A director by training, he has been working in the theater in a wide variety of functions and production contexts since 1986. Stations included the Ulmer Theater, the Pocket Opera Company Nuremberg, the Schauspiel Frankfurt and various independent productions. Since 2006 the LICHTHOF Theater Hamburg, from 2008 as artistic director. After further education studies as "Culture and Education Manager" (HWP Hamburg) and various other further education (Change Manager, Management Trainer, Business Coach, Quality Manager), he developed his second professional pillar as a lecturer, consultant and coach since 2000, primarily in the qualification of managers and in organizational consulting. Since 2019, he has been a member of the board of the Bundesverband Freier Darstellender Künste (BFDK). From 2014 to 2019 he was chairman of the board of trustees of the Fonds Darstellende Künste, he was a jury member of, among others, the "Theaterpreis des Bundes" (2019), the "Reload" program of the Kulturstiftung des Bundes (2020) and the Körber Studio Junge Regie (2021).

Antje Thoms, director and author, was born in Stralsund, studied Applied Theater Studies in Giessen and was subsequently assistant director at the Lower Saxony State Theater in Hanover. There she worked with Sebastian Nübling, Andreas Kriegenburg, Luk Perceval and Jossi Wieler, among others. She has been working as a freelancer since 2003. In 2007, together with the author Jens Nielsen and the actor Dominique Müller, she founded the independent Zurich theater formation Trainingslager. Since the 14/15 season, Antje Thoms has been in-house director at the Deutsches Theater Göttingen with artistic director Erich Sidler. In 2020, she completed the in-service training program "Theater and Music Management" at the LMU Munich as a scholarship holder of the German Stage Association, and in 2021 she will participate in the mentoring program "Women in Culture and Media" of the German Cultural Council.

Katharina Wolfrum studied theater, modern German literature and psychology in Munich and Stockholm, as well as cultural and media management in Berlin. At Freie Universität Berlin, she worked at the Creative Industries Competence Center and conducted research in particular on places of creative development in urban spaces. This topic then drew Katharina to the creative quarter of Munich in 2015: first as artistic production manager at the PATHOS Theater and soon with her own initiatives such as the Theaterbüro München - an advisory office for the independent performing arts - or the collective "Büro Grandezza e. V.". In addition, she is committed to the further development of this creative quarter as a central location for Munich's independent scene with a special focus on "sustainability and culture". Since the beginning of 2020, Katharina is responsible for the theater, film and cinema funding of the Cultural Department of the City of Munich.

Fatima Çalışkan is a moderator, artist and author. Her focus is on art and cultural policy issues on which she writes analyses and essays, among others for the Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft, or develops satirical texts for independent productions. She is co-founder and co-editor of the biennial magazine YallahSalon. As a presenter, she plays the entire keyboard of conversation and presentation formats for stage, audio and video. As a performer and dramaturge, she collaborates with various projects in the independent scene. Other positions include advising and accompanying projects for the Interkultur Ruhr funding fund, co-directing the advisory office of the Performing Arts Program of the LAFT Berlin, co-directing the FAIRSTAGE model project, and jury activities at the federal and state levels.

Dorte Lena Eilers is professor and head of the master's program "Cultural Journalism" at the University of Music and Theater in Munich in cooperation with the August Everding Theater Academy. She also works as a cultural journalist, predominantly in the fields of music and theater against the background of socio-political developments. Previously, she was editor from 2007 to 2021, most recently editor-in-chief of Theater der Zeit. She is a member of the German Academy of Performing Arts and the advisory board of the magazine "junge bühne" and has served on various juries (including the German Federal Theater Prize and the Mülheim Theater Days). Publications (as co-editor) include Frank Castorf, Dimiter Gotscheff, Bulgarian theater and new German-language drama. Most recently, her volume of talks "backstage TSCHEPLANOWA" was published.

Yunus Ersoy, who grew up in Zurich, is a dramaturg*. After completing a BA, Yunus studied for an MA at the University of Zurich (Cultural Analysis) and Applied Theater Studies in Giessen.

In 2009 Ersoy was a founding member of "oimoi - junges theater zürich", is still a member of the board of directors, and has been involved in over 10 oimoi productions on and off stage. At the Schauspielhaus Zürich, Ersoy has been part of choruses in plays by René Pollesch, among others.

Ersoy organizes festivals (including Queer Week in 2021-2023) and has performed own works with the collective Mora Vegesture at Künstlerhaus Mousonturm, with Camila Rhodi at the FACT Festival in Budapest, and with Josef Mehling at 48h Neukölln in Berlin. In 2020, Jil Dreyer, Ersoy and Mehling presented the theater performance None of This at the Grätsche Festival in Zurich.

After an internship at Studio Я, Ersoy worked as an assistant and then as a dramaturg at the Maxim Gorki Theater in Berlin since the middle of the 2018/19 season, working with directors Yael Ronen, Hakan Savaş Mican, and Paul Spittler, among others.

In the 2023/24 season, Ersoy will work as a dramaturg* at the Schauspielhaus Zürich with Suna Gürler and Joana Tischkau.

After studying theater studies and communication and media studies in Leipzig and Glasgow, Thomas Frank was assistant to the artistic director, dramaturg and curator at Künstlerhaus Mousonturm Frankfurt am Main from 2000 to 2004 and program dramaturg at Sophiensaele Berlin from 2005 to 2007. In 2007, together with Haiko Pfost, he founded brut Wien as an international co-production house for interdisciplinary performing arts, which he led in artistic and executive responsibility until 2015. Already in their second season, Thomas Frank and Haiko Pfost were awarded the Nestroy Prize of the City of Vienna for the brut program. From 2015 to 2017, Thomas Frank was engaged as a freelance curator at Theater VabaLava in Tallinn, Estonia. Since the 2016/2017 season, he has been artistic director of the Residenz venue at Schauspiel Leipzig. At the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy and at the Hochschule für Graphik und Buchkunst in Leipzig, he has been a lecturer since 2018.

Sabine Kuhfuss studied education, sociology and cultural management in Bielefeld and Hannover. After assisting the team leader of the cultural department of the city of Detmold and co-directing the festival for performing arts in public space "Bildstörung" from 2010 to 2018, she has been the technical-artistic director of the KulturTeam of the city of Detmold and artistic director of the festival "Bildstörung" since 2019. She is interested in the effects and perspectives of performing arts as well as interdisciplinary formats in public space, especially their relevance for municipal culture.

Since 2014, she has been an associate member of the European network for the promotion and development of artistic creations in public space In Situ. As a board member of the Bundesverband Theater im öffentlichen Raum e.V., she is committed to the development and promotion of the genre.

Anne-Cathrin Lessel, born in 1987, studied theater, psychology and cultural studies at the University of Leipzig. Until 2011, she worked as a freelancer in artistic projects with children and young people, primarily at the Theater an der Parkaue Berlin. From 2011, program and production manager at LOFFT - DAS THEATER, whose artistic direction and management she took over in 2019. Since 2013 she has been a board member of the Bundesverband Freie Darstellende Künste and since 2020 a board member of the Landesverband der Freien Theater in Sachsen. For many years she has been a member of various professional juries, including those of the City of Leipzig, the Cultural Foundation of the Free State of Saxony, the German National Academic Foundation, the National Performance Network and the Fonds Darstellende Künste.

Marcus Lobbes has been working as a director, set designer and writer in music and spoken theater since 1995. He is also the director of the Academy for Theater and Digitality, the newly founded sixth division at Theater Dortmund in 2019. He has worked, among others with a focus on premieres and first performances, at many renowned drama and opera houses (e.g. Schauspiel Düsseldorf, Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Nationaltheater Mannheim, state theaters in Kassel, Mainz, Saarbrücken, Darmstadt and Braunschweig, Schauspiel Dortmund, Wuppertaler Bühnen, Theater Freiburg and many others). Novel collective work forms with the ensembles as well as his close contact to contemporary authors and composers characterize his artistic work. Since 2014, he has been regularly invited as a guest lecturer at various renowned colleges and universities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. As director of the Dortmund Academy, he is in demand locally, nationally and internationally in lecture and discourse formats; an important concern for him is the formation and promotion of a wide variety of networks for the performing arts as well as the communication of artistic research in correspondence with the latest technologies to theater and educational institutions, politics and the public.

Lara-Sophie Milagro, Berlin, studied acting in London and New York and singing in Berlin. She has performed at the Staatstheater Mainz, Theater Kassel, Gorki Theater Berlin, Residenztheater Munich and at the Münchner Kammerspiele. Collaboration with directors such as Frank Patrick Steckl, Antoine Uitdehaag and Julia Wissert. As a writer / director she wrote / directed "Heimat, bittersweet Heimat" (Ballhaus Naunynstrasse '11), "Satoe" (Nationaltheater Mannheim '13), "Dauerkolonie Berlin" (Ballhaus Naunynstrasse, '18), "Winterzeit (HAU Berlin, '18), "Auf Noahs blutigem Regenbogen tanzen wir" (Gorki Theater Berlin, '20) and participated in all these productions also as an actress. She has also appeared in numerous film and television productions, including Tatort Weimar (ARD '17), "Dogs of Berlin" (Netflix '18) and the TV multi-part "Das Geheimnis des Totenwaldes" (ARD, '20) alongside Matthias Brandt and Karoline Schuch. She is also a voice actress, most recently for the Netflix production "His House" ('20) and the Arte film "Les Heritieres" ('21). From 2018-2021, she also wrote the monthly column "Heimatgeschichten" for nachtkritik.de. In 2022, the theater film "Emmett, tief in meinem Herzen" will be released (premiered at Hebbel Theater Berlin), in which Lara-Sophie Milagro participated as an actress, director and producer.

Tom Mustroph, born in Berlin, works here and Palermo as a freelance author as well as a freelance dramaturg. After studying literature, theater and cultural studies in Berlin and Paris, he operates in social subsystems as diverse as theater, the art scene and sports. He is primarily interested in how self-responsible work can succeed elegantly and in compliance with minimum moral standards (sometimes in theater and art) and which constellations systematically lead to failure (doping, game manipulation and the Mafia).

Gregor Runge, born in Dresden, studied theater studies and comparative literature in Bochum and worked for the Impulse and FAVORITEN theater festivals, among others. From 2011 he worked as a dramaturg primarily with Samir Akika/Unusual Symptoms and the Theater im Pumpenhaus Münster. In 2012 he went to Theater Bremen as dramaturg. In 2015 and 2017 he co-directed the international performing arts festival OUTNOW! in cooperation with Schwankhalle Bremen. He has worked on projects for the Goethe-Institut in Novosibirsk and for the Goethe-Institut Ukraine. Since the 2018/2019 season, he has been co-directing the dance division of Theater Bremen with the company Unusual Symptoms together with Alexandra Morales. Under their co-direction, productions with internationally renowned choreographers such as Faye Driscoll, Adrienn Hód, Máté Mészáros and Núria Guiu Sagarra are created alongside the work of house choreographer Samir Akika. Two of the works created since then were invited to the Tanzplattform Deutschland in 2020. Gregor Runge is a regular member of various juries, including the board of trustees of the Fonds Darstellende Künste from 2018 - 2021 and for the state of NRW. In addition, he initiated and is responsible for the concert series Theater Bremen CLUB, which regularly presents artists* from the global jazz and pop landscape for the first time in Bremen.

Matthias Schulze-Kraft is the artistic director of the LICHTHOF Theater, a venue and production center for independent theater in Hamburg. A director by training, he has been working in the theater in a wide variety of functions and production contexts since 1986. Stations included the Ulmer Theater, the Pocket Opera Company Nuremberg, the Schauspiel Frankfurt and various independent productions. Since 2006 the LICHTHOF Theater Hamburg, from 2008 as artistic director. After further education studies as "Culture and Education Manager" (HWP Hamburg) and various other further education (Change Manager, Management Trainer, Business Coach, Quality Manager), he developed his second professional pillar as a lecturer, consultant and coach since 2000, primarily in the qualification of managers and in organizational consulting. Since 2019, he has been a member of the board of the Bundesverband Freier Darstellender Künste (BFDK). From 2014 to 2019 he was chairman of the board of trustees of the Fonds Darstellende Künste, he was a jury member of, among others, the "Theaterpreis des Bundes" (2019), the "Reload" program of the Kulturstiftung des Bundes (2020) and the Körber Studio Junge Regie (2021).

After studying literature and history, Katja Spiess found her way into the Stuttgart cultural scene through programmatic and organizational work at various cultural festivals (including "Theater der Welt", "Natur im Kopf - Kongress zum Naturbegriff der Gegenwart"). She is a member of the FITZ! Zentrum für Figurentheater since 1993. In the first years she was responsible for press and public relations. In 1998 she took over the management of the FITZ in cooperation with Helmut Pogerth, and in 2001 she became the sole director. Katja Spiess is also the artistic director of the International Figure Theater Festival IMAGINALE and a member of the editorial board of the theater journal "double".

Felizitas Stilleke is a freelance dramaturg, artist and curator. She directs conferences, such as the B.A.L.L. - Bundesweites Artist Labor of the Labore 2022, the Branchentreff 2019-2021, the Bundesforum 2017 or the RATSCHLAG DER VIELEN 2019, and takes over festival dramaturgies (Berliner Theatertreffen 2018, Impulse Theaterfestivals 2017 (under Florian Malzacher) or together with Johanna Yasirra Kluhs the theater festival FAVORITEN 2014) and is on the road as a production dramaturg in NRW, Berlin, Amsterdam and Zurich. She completed her Bachelor of German Studies/Education in Bochum and a Master in Cultural Poetics at the Wilhelms University in Münster. In 2018/19, she studied "Expanded Curation" as part of the international master's program at DAS theatre in Amsterdam. In 2020, she launched a series of podcast sessions at Ballhaus Ost titled "The Mother in Me is the Mother in You," in which she subjects the topic of not-yet/not-more/maybe/maternity to a collective rededication of discourse.

Antje Thoms, director and author, was born in Stralsund, studied Applied Theater Studies in Giessen and was subsequently assistant director at the Lower Saxony State Theater in Hanover. There she worked with Sebastian Nübling, Andreas Kriegenburg, Luk Perceval and Jossi Wieler, among others. She has been working as a freelancer since 2003. In 2007, together with the author Jens Nielsen and the actor Dominique Müller, she founded the independent Zurich theater formation Trainingslager. Since the 14/15 season, Antje Thoms has been in-house director at the Deutsches Theater Göttingen with artistic director Erich Sidler. In 2020, she completed the in-service training program "Theater and Music Management" at the LMU Munich as a scholarship holder of the German Stage Association, and in 2021 she will participate in the mentoring program "Women in Culture and Media" of the German Cultural Council.

Prof. Dr. Renée Tribble is head of the department StädteBauProzesse - urban development, urban land use planning and urban design processes - at the Faculty of Spatial Planning at TU Dortmund University. Previously, she was a visiting professor for urban management and urban development planning at the University of Kassel and a professor for planning theory and methodology at the TH OWL Detmold. After studying architecture at Bauhaus University Weimar (diploma 2005), she worked in architectural and planning offices and taught at HafenCity University (HCU) Hamburg as a research assistant (2008 - 2014) and lecturer. In her doctoral thesis (2021) she deals with artistic methods of urban development under the title "Reizungen und Reaktionen: Kunst und Planung" (Art and Planning). She is co-founder and shareholder of PlanBude Hamburg, of projektbüro Hamburg as well as honorary board member of fux eG.

Stefanie Wenner is a mother, companion of a dog, PhD philosopher and since 2015 professor of applied theater studies at the HfBK Dresden. With her label apparatus she works on better representations of reality with the means of art.

Katharina Wolfrum studied theater, modern German literature and psychology in Munich and Stockholm, as well as cultural and media management in Berlin. At Freie Universität Berlin, she worked at the Creative Industries Competence Center and conducted research in particular on places of creative development in urban spaces. This topic then drew Katharina to the creative quarter of Munich in 2015: first as artistic production manager at the PATHOS Theater and soon with her own initiatives such as the Theaterbüro München - an advisory office for the independent performing arts - or the collective "Büro Grandezza e. V.". In addition, she is committed to the further development of this creative quarter as a central location for Munich's independent scene with a special focus on "sustainability and culture". Since the beginning of 2020, Katharina is responsible for the theater, film and cinema funding of the Cultural Department of the City of Munich.

Stephan Wunsch ist Puppenspieler, Figurenbildner und Regisseur. Er studierte Philosophie und Germanistik in Aachen und belegte Seminare in Figurenspiel und Figurenbau auf Hof Lebherz. 2003 gründete er die Bühne theater rosenfisch. Seitdem produziert er zahlreiche Inszenierungen für Kinder und Erwachsene; außerdem Regiearbeiten, Figurenbau und Bühnenmusik für andere Bühnen.

Neben dieser Tätigkeit ist er Teil der Redaktion von ‚Das andere Theater‘, die offizielle Zeitschrift des UNIMA-Zentrums der Bundesrepublik Deutschland e.V., die zwei Mal jährlich erscheint.

Beate Baron has been Professor of Music Theater at the HfM Saar since 2021. She taught at the HfM Hanns Eisler Berlin, the MH Lübeck and the HMT Rostock. Beate Baron studied directing with Götz Friedrich Hfmt Hamburg and directing and interdisciplinary composition at the HfM "Hanns Eisler" Berlin and works as a director for music theater and opera, as well as a curator. Her artistic works arise in the field of tension between music theater, installations, opera and video. She has developed award-winning productions for a wide variety of venues and festivals, including the Ruhrtriennale, Festspielhaus Hellerau, Radial System, Staatsoper Berlin, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Oper Frankfurt, Theater Freiburg, and many others. A long and intensive artistic collaboration connected her with Götz Friedrich, Hans Neuenfels and Jürgen Flimm.

Fatima Çalışkan is a moderator, artist and author. Her focus is on art and cultural policy issues on which she writes analyses and essays, among others for the Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft, or develops satirical texts for independent productions. She is co-founder and co-editor of the biennial magazine YallahSalon. As a presenter, she plays the entire keyboard of conversation and presentation formats for stage, audio and video. As a performer and dramaturge, she collaborates with various projects in the independent scene. Other positions include advising and accompanying projects for the Interkultur Ruhr funding fund, co-directing the advisory office of the Performing Arts Program of the LAFT Berlin, co-directing the FAIRSTAGE model project, and jury activities at the federal and state levels.

Dorte Lena Eilers is professor and head of the master's program "Cultural Journalism" at the University of Music and Theater in Munich in cooperation with the August Everding Theater Academy. She also works as a cultural journalist, predominantly in the fields of music and theater against the background of socio-political developments. Previously, she was editor from 2007 to 2021, most recently editor-in-chief of Theater der Zeit. She is a member of the German Academy of Performing Arts and the advisory board of the magazine "junge bühne" and has served on various juries (including the German Federal Theater Prize and the Mülheim Theater Days). Publications (as co-editor) include Frank Castorf, Dimiter Gotscheff, Bulgarian theater and new German-language drama. Most recently, her volume of talks "backstage TSCHEPLANOWA" was published.

Janis El-Bira, born in Braunschweig in 1986, studied philosophy and history in Berlin and has since worked as a journalist and presenter with a focus on theater. He is an editor for the theater portal nachtkritik.de and a presenter and editor for the program "Rang 1 - Das Theatermagazin" on Deutschlandfunk Kultur. In addition, texts and contributions for various newspapers and radio stations. From 2016 to 2021 he headed the journalistic project for young talent "Theatertreffen-Blog" at the Berliner Festspiele. Jury activities include the Mülheim Drama Prize 2021, the Fast Forward 2021 festival in Dresden, and the Politik im Freien Theater 2022 festival in Frankfurt am Main.

Since 1994 artistic director and director of the Theater Mummpitz in Nuremberg and since 2000 artistic director of the biennial European-Bavarian children's theater festival "panoptikum". In addition, continuously active in the field of cultural policy as well as in various national and international associations for the promotion of professional children's and youth theater. Among other things, she was a long-standing board member and deputy chairwoman of the German ASSITEJ e.V. until January 2022.

Member of the Nuremberg Education Advisory Board, since 2009 responsible for the conceptualization , implementation and project management of the 1st Nuremberg Kulturrucksack.

Since 2019/2020 responsible for the project development "Mummpitz macht Schule. Klasse."

Since January 2022 artistic director of the three-year Jupiter project "Memories" in cooperation with CIE Gare centrale/Belgium, AdDK Regensburg and Theater Mummpitz.

Since 2022 member of the board of trustees of the Fonds Darstellende Künste.

Katrin Hylla studied Applied Theater Studies in Giessen. Prior to that, she worked as an actress, director, and assistant director in Berlin's independent scene, including at HAU, Theaterdiscounter, as well as municipal and state theaters (Maxim Gorki Theater, Hessisches Landestheater Marburg, and others). Until March 2021, she worked at the independent venue TNT in Marburg as part of the artistic direction and management. In 2016 she founded the festival FÜR DICH FÜR DICH FÜR DICH, a format for contemporary positions and performances extended by working grants. As a director, she realizes plays with children, among others, and was awarded the prize of the Hessische Theatertage 2017 for it. She likes to initiate and stage formats that are open to professional and non-professional performers and musicians of all ages. For example, she created Die erste Kinderpartei Deutschland (Germany's first children's party), the audio installation Heimat #3 on a beer mountain made of 2000 beer crates, or is currently working on Bootsballet with brass music on the Werdersee in Bremen. Katrin Hylla is partly active as a lecturer e.g. at the HAWK Hildesheim and Uni Gießen. At the moment she is preparing her work as artistic director of the Schwankhalle Bremen, which she will lead in a trio from August 23.

Geboren 1975, begann er 1994 in unterschiedlichen Funktionen hauptsächlich in den darstellenden Künsten zu arbeiten. Am Anfang hat er viel in Staats- und Stadttheatern gelernt und arbeitet seit 2003 selbständig als Autor, Kurator, Dramaturg und Regisseur. Hier hat er besonders viel Erfahrung als Regisseur von Galen und Charity-Veranstaltungen gesammelt, die wichtige Inhalte und große Unterhaltung miteinander präsentieren. 2013 hat er für das Performing Arts Programm Berlin (PAP) den Branchentreff der Freien Darstellenden Künste Berlin mitkonzipiert und zusammen mit anderen bis 2017 geleitet. Für das PAP konzipiert er auch weiterhin Fachtagungen, die spezifische Themen für ein professionelles Publikum vertiefen.

2016 hat er für das PAP zusammen mit der re:publica die Performersion gegründet, ein Format für Kooperationen der digitalen und der darstellenden Künste, das er seitdem auch mit einem inzwischen internationalen Fokus fortführt.

Die kuratorische Arbeit an der Schnittstille zwischen digitalen und analogen Künsten setzt er in Laborformaten für die Technologiestiftung Berlin u.a. oder als Mitglied des Culture Track Teams der re:publica um. Vermittelnd arbeitet er in diesem Spannungsfeld auch als Beiratsmitglied der bbw – University for Applied Sciences, des Berlinforums der Stiftung Zukunft Berlin, als Speaker oder Workshopgeber.

Sabine Kuhfuss studied education, sociology and cultural management in Bielefeld and Hannover. After assisting the team leader of the cultural department of the city of Detmold and co-directing the festival for performing arts in public space "Bildstörung" from 2010 to 2018, she has been the technical-artistic director of the KulturTeam of the city of Detmold and artistic director of the festival "Bildstörung" since 2019. She is interested in the effects and perspectives of performing arts as well as interdisciplinary formats in public space, especially their relevance for municipal culture.

Since 2014, she has been an associate member of the European network for the promotion and development of artistic creations in public space In Situ. As a board member of the Bundesverband Theater im öffentlichen Raum e.V., she is committed to the development and promotion of the genre.

Anne-Cathrin Lessel, born in 1987, studied theater, psychology and cultural studies at the University of Leipzig. Until 2011, she worked as a freelancer in artistic projects with children and young people, primarily at the Theater an der Parkaue Berlin. From 2011, program and production manager at LOFFT - DAS THEATER, whose artistic direction and management she took over in 2019. Since 2013 she has been a board member of the Bundesverband Freie Darstellende Künste and since 2020 a board member of the Landesverband der Freien Theater in Sachsen. For many years she has been a member of various professional juries, including those of the City of Leipzig, the Cultural Foundation of the Free State of Saxony, the German National Academic Foundation, the National Performance Network and the Fonds Darstellende Künste.

Marcus Lobbes has been working as a director, set designer and writer in music and spoken theater since 1995. He is also the director of the Academy for Theater and Digitality, the newly founded sixth division at Theater Dortmund in 2019. He has worked, among others with a focus on premieres and first performances, at many renowned drama and opera houses (e.g. Schauspiel Düsseldorf, Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Nationaltheater Mannheim, state theaters in Kassel, Mainz, Saarbrücken, Darmstadt and Braunschweig, Schauspiel Dortmund, Wuppertaler Bühnen, Theater Freiburg and many others). Novel collective work forms with the ensembles as well as his close contact to contemporary authors and composers characterize his artistic work. Since 2014, he has been regularly invited as a guest lecturer at various renowned colleges and universities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. As director of the Dortmund Academy, he is in demand locally, nationally and internationally in lecture and discourse formats; an important concern for him is the formation and promotion of a wide variety of networks for the performing arts as well as the communication of artistic research in correspondence with the latest technologies to theater and educational institutions, politics and the public.

Tom Mustroph, born in Berlin, works here and Palermo as a freelance author as well as a freelance dramaturg. After studying literature, theater and cultural studies in Berlin and Paris, he operates in social subsystems as diverse as theater, the art scene and sports. He is primarily interested in how self-responsible work can succeed elegantly and in compliance with minimum moral standards (sometimes in theater and art) and which constellations systematically lead to failure (doping, game manipulation and the Mafia).

In addition to her work as Artistic Co-Director of Ballhaus Ost, Tina Pfurr works as a curator, performer, actress and speaker and also develops her own projects. Pfurr has been a board member of LAFT Berlin since 2017 and is a regular member of award and festival juries (including 2017-2020 Kulturbehörde Hamburg; 2021 Körber Stiftung Junge Regie). Most recently she realized the performance I just called to say... sHe's dead. which was published online as a 5-part video work in February 2021. Since 2014, she has toured the world with the dance karaoke performance copy & dance. Pfurr also produces video works, the two video essays Applied AXXXD-Gendering (2017) and SelfFanfic - An Exorcism (2019) have been shown at various festivals. In recent years she has worked in various theaters, worldwide, as a performer and actress and conceives performative moderations. In addition to her theater work, she is also an actress for film and television.

After her studies at the Humboldt University in Berlin, she worked as a research assistant at the Academy of Arts of the GDR. In 1996 she was co-founder and until 2003 curator of the theater festival "reich & berühmt". From 1997 to 2002 she was head of the theater/performance department at Podewil, Center for Contemporary Arts in Berlin. Here she realized various co-productions, guest performances and international festivals, including the 1997 festival "Live Art - New theatre for the 90s" with young British performers.

She worked at the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz from 2002 to 2011, mainly as curator for the Volksbühne im Prater. In 2010 and 2012 she was artistic director of the theater festival "Favoriten" in Dortmund and during the season 2011/2012 dramaturg at the Residenztheater Munich.

Various publications, including: René Pollesch, "Liebe ist kälter als das Kapital," Hamburg 2009 and Postdramatic Theater in Portraits/Gob Squad "What are you looking at?", Berlin 2020.

Carena Schlewitt was born in Leipzig in 1961. Since 2018, she has been the artistic director of HELLERAU - European Center for the Arts in Dresden.

She was Director of Kaserne Basel from 2008-2018 and Artistic Director of the Basel International Theater Festival (since 2012). She studied theater at the Humboldt University in Berlin and worked at the Academy of Arts in East Berlin from 1985 to 1993. She worked as dramaturge, curator and deputy artistic director at various independent production houses (Podewil Berlin; FFT Düsseldorf; HAU Berlin) and at international festivals (Theater der Welt; HAU Berlin).

The focal points of her work have included the transformation processes in East Germany, Eastern Europe and China and the development of theater in Poland, France and Italy as well as live art and performance art. She has served on various juries, including for the "Impulse" festival; for the German-Polish expert panel of the Kulturstiftung des Bundes as well as for the "Doppelpass" program of the Kulturstiftung des Bundes; she was a member of the expert commission of the Swiss cultural foundation Pro Helvetia.

Carena Schlewitt is a member of the Saxon Academy of Arts, the Saxon Cultural Senate and a member of the Expert Advisory Board for Performing Arts and Music at the Cultural Foundation of the Free State of Saxony.

Antje Thoms, director and author, was born in Stralsund, studied Applied Theater Studies in Giessen and was subsequently assistant director at the Lower Saxony State Theater in Hanover. There she worked with Sebastian Nübling, Andreas Kriegenburg, Luk Perceval and Jossi Wieler, among others. She has been working as a freelancer since 2003. In 2007, together with the author Jens Nielsen and the actor Dominique Müller, she founded the independent Zurich theater formation Trainingslager. Since the 14/15 season, Antje Thoms has been in-house director at the Deutsches Theater Göttingen with artistic director Erich Sidler. In 2020, she completed the in-service training program "Theater and Music Management" at the LMU Munich as a scholarship holder of the German Stage Association, and in 2021 she will participate in the mentoring program "Women in Culture and Media" of the German Cultural Council.

Prof. Dr. Hans-Joachim Wagner (born 1961) studied musicology, German philology and art history before working as a cultural manager, curator, researcher and author. He most recently worked as head of the department of music and performing arts at the Kunststiftung NRW in Düsseldorf. Wagner worked at the opera houses in Koblenz and Cologne as a production dramaturge, personal assistant to the artistic director and member of the opera management staff. From 2002 to 2006, he worked as a music referent in the cultural office of the city of Cologne and took over the coordination of the music department during the application of the city of Cologne for the title of European Capital of Culture 2010.

In Cologne, he curated the cultural program for the 2006 World Cup, was artistic director of the festival "Feste Musicali" and the children's and youth music festival "Stadt Klang Fluss". For some time, he has been particularly interested in contemporary dance and theater, the diversity of cultural practice and its visualization.

Since January 2, 2018, the scientist and cultural manager Prof. Dr. Hans-Joachim Wagner has been head of the office for Nuremberg's application for the title of European Capital of Culture 2025.

Katharina Wolfrum studied theater, modern German literature and psychology in Munich and Stockholm, as well as cultural and media management in Berlin. At Freie Universität Berlin, she worked at the Creative Industries Competence Center and conducted research in particular on places of creative development in urban spaces. This topic then drew Katharina to the creative quarter of Munich in 2015: first as artistic production manager at the PATHOS Theater and soon with her own initiatives such as the Theaterbüro München - an advisory office for the independent performing arts - or the collective "Büro Grandezza e. V.". In addition, she is committed to the further development of this creative quarter as a central location for Munich's independent scene with a special focus on "sustainability and culture". Since the beginning of 2020, Katharina is responsible for the theater, film and cinema funding of the Cultural Department of the City of Munich.

Stephan Wunsch ist Puppenspieler, Figurenbildner und Regisseur. Er studierte Philosophie und Germanistik in Aachen und belegte Seminare in Figurenspiel und Figurenbau auf Hof Lebherz. 2003 gründete er die Bühne theater rosenfisch. Seitdem produziert er zahlreiche Inszenierungen für Kinder und Erwachsene; außerdem Regiearbeiten, Figurenbau und Bühnenmusik für andere Bühnen.

Neben dieser Tätigkeit ist er Teil der Redaktion von ‚Das andere Theater‘, die offizielle Zeitschrift des UNIMA-Zentrums der Bundesrepublik Deutschland e.V., die zwei Mal jährlich erscheint.

Born in Odenwald in 1982, studied psychology in Berlin and Paris and speech and musical theater direction at the Theaterakademie "August Everding" in Munich. Doctorate (ongoing) "Culture, Operation and Resonance" with Hartmut Rosa and Friedrich von Borries, HfBK Hamburg. Scholarship holder of the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes, the Gabriele-Oehmisch-Stiftung and the Akademie Musiktheater Heute of the Deutsche Bank Foundation.

As a freelance dramaturg, he has worked for a variety of productions in Germany and abroad (including Kampnagel, Schaubühne, Schauspielhaus Zürich, Theater Basel, Alfortville Paris). As founder, director and dramaturg he developed a number of site-specific productions with the independent group O-Team (including "HermannSchlachten" at the Stuttgart Wagenhallen, "Blaupause" in the former editorial building of the Süddeutsche Zeitung or "Kirschgärten" at the Hofgut Oberfeld Darmstadt) and most recently "Flüchtlinge" at the Thalia Theater Hamburg.

From 2011 to 2013 he was head dramaturge/member of the artistic direction at Theaterhaus Jena and in the 2014/2015 season drama director at Staatstheater Darmstadt. He has worked as festival curator and dramaturge (Rodeo Festival Munich, Datterich Festival Darmstadt, Wiesbaden Biennale) and lecturer (LMU and HfMT Munich, HfMT Leipzig, TU Darmstadt, JGU and HfMT Frankfurt, JGU Mainz, EAH and FSU Jena). Zipf directed JenaKultur from 2016 to 2022. Since the 2022/23 season, he has been executive director at Kampnagel Hamburg.