With the support of the regional association TanzSzene Bremen, we are resuming our well-established format, the TANZSALON.

As before, it will take place on the 10th of every month at 8:00 pm at TAFI – regardless of which day of the week the 10th falls on.

Many of you have told us how much you missed the TANZSALON as a place of encounter and exchange within Bremen’s dance scene. Since the last time, quite a lot has happened – at TAFI, but surely also with you: new productions, new films, new guests.

We warmly invite you to celebrate the first TANZSALON after the long break with us. The evening’s theme will be TAFI’s latest documentary: “Vulnerably Beautiful. Dance between Elegance and Risk – A Study by Goethe University Frankfurt.”

The film accompanies a medical study on physical strain in professional dance. Prof. Dr. Dr. Eileen Wanke of Goethe University Frankfurt, head of the research project, will introduce the topic.

Drinks will be provided – just bring yourselves, and feel free to bring along new people and friends.

Friday, October 10 at 8:00 pm
Deutsches Tanzfilminstitut Bremen
Am Wall 201 / Forum am Wall
Entrance Ostertorstraße, next to the bakery

Translation by ChatGPT

On Wednesday, June 18th, the Hochschule für Künste class Cinematic Spaces visited the Deutsches Tanzfilminstitut, where we were greeted by the institute’s director, Heide-Marie Härtel. As she guided us through the premises, we were introduced to several facets of the institute—one major highlight being the opportunity to see where many original dance films are digitized for the archive. The digitization studio features a fully customized system that accommodates a range of analog moving-image formats. Multiple dance films (from various time periods) play simultaneously on a collection of stacked CRT television monitors, and the entire experience of seeing such a system at work feels akin to stepping into a multi-channel video installation—dedicated solely to dance film.

Throughout the tour, our class was given glimpses into several examples from the institute’s extensive archive of dance videos, as well as other films that document a history of collaborative projects between the Deutsches Tanzfilminstitut and numerous international partners. Several of the dance works shown incorporated elements of the visual arts, including video, sound, sculpture, and multimedia installation. In essence, we were invited to consider dance and the stage as another possibility for what a “cinematic space” could embody.

Alex Beriault

Can a body over 50 still dance? And if so, how? This guest lecture deals with this question.

Susan Barnett, dancer and dance teacher from Bremen, was invited to give this lecture. Barnett comes from Wales, has danced internationally – including with the Ballet Municipal de Santiago and in Hans Kresnik’s ensemble – and has been a freelance dancer for many years. With a Master’s degree in Dance Science and a wide range of projects between stage art, dance education and community dance, she deals intensively with the topics of body, age and expression.

In professional dance in particular, age often seems to be a criterion for exclusion. While mature artists and (fewer) female artists are still on stage in film and theatre, professional dancers often disappear from the limelight at an early age. What are the reasons for this? Is it an outdated ideal of eternal youth, agility and peak physical performance?

But dance can do more. Mobility, joie de vivre, expression – all of this can be maintained and even enhanced into old age.

This guest lecture ‘Age on Stage’ therefore focussed not only on the question of health benefits, but above all on artistic perspectives:

Is getting older on the dance stage really a taboo?
What new forms of expression emerge when the body emphasises qualities other than bounce and speed?
And how can images of age be shifted in art?

‘Age on Stage’ is an invitation to rethink dance: not as a privilege of youth, but as a lifelong form of movement and expression.

As part of the event ‘Dance – Excursions into the inner world of dance’, we welcome Prof. Dr Dr Eileen Wanke from the Institute for Occupational, Social and Environmental Medicine at Goethe University Frankfurt as a special guest.

Prof. Wanke is leading a research project to analyse movement patterns in professional stage dance. State-of-the-art kinematic methods are used to scientifically analyse stresses and risks for dancers – work that opens up new perspectives on prevention and health promotion in dance.

Where does art end, where does medicine begin? In her lecture ‘From dance to dance medicine’, Prof. Dr Dr Eileen M. Wanke sheds light on the development of dance from an elementary human form of movement to a profession with special physical requirements – and the emergence of dance medicine as an independent interdisciplinary field.

Using historical examples, Prof Wanke shows how dance has always been used to maintain health. At the same time, she outlines the specific stresses and risks that professional dancers are exposed to as part of their training and profession.

The focus is on the question: How can medical knowledge help to prevent injuries, maintain performance and ensure the long-term health of dancers?

A lecture with film contribution between dance art and science – understandable, practical and with a view to current research results.

How does dance change when it is centred on a single person? And what social impulses are contained in this form? Heide-Marie Härtel, founder and director of the German Dance Film Institute Bremen, opens her five-part lecture on the topic of ‘100 years of solo dance’ with these questions. The seminar is a cooperation with the Dance and Theatre in Social Work course at the University of Arts in Ottersberg under the direction of Prof. Leonardo Cruz.

Heide-Marie Härtel uses selected film clips from the archive to provide insights into the works of outstanding solo dancers.

An inspiring look back and forward – in the spirit of dance as both an individual and social act.

But dance is fleeting. What remains are recordings. This is where the German Dance Film Institute Bremen comes into play: under the direction of Heide-Marie Härtel, herself once a soloist under Hans Kresnik, Europe’s largest dance film archive has been created since the 1980s. Over 40,000 film and video documents are stored directly above the Bremen City Library – many of them works by John Neumeier, recorded in TV quality.

The series of events also presents the archive itself. Heide-Marie Härtel will provide personal insights: as a former dancer and as an archivist who preserves dance for future generations.

Three events are planned at the German Dance Film Institute Bremen, which can also be followed online via Zoom.

Dance lives on. In movement, in memory – and in film.

Dr. Monika Thiele

Inspiration and legacy of great female choreographers from Bremen theatre

What impulses do artists whose works have had a lasting impact on the world of dance provide? This year’s winter semester series at the German Dance Film Institute Bremen is looking at this question. Four film lectures will focus on influential figures in contemporary dance, all of whom are closely associated with Bremen’s theatre.

The interplay of film documentaries, examples of their work and background information will make artistic signatures and social references visible.

The film lectures will be led by Heide-Marie Härtel, founder and artistic director of the German Dance Film Institute Bremen. Härtel combines film documentaries, personal memories and professional categorisation. The seminar invites you to understand dance history not just as archive material, but as living heritage.

The dates at a glance:

18 October 2025, 8 pm: Johann Kresnik
The ‘political choreographer’: radical, provocative, uncomfortable.

15 November 2025, 8 pm: Reinhild Hoffmann
Poetic and body-conscious: dance theatre between image and movement.

13 December 2025, 8 pm: Susanne Linke
Strict form and expressive power: from solo to ensemble work.

17 January 2026, 8 pm: Urs Dietrich
The quiet creator: dance as a personal and collective narrative

All events take place at the Deutsches Tanzfilminstitut Bremen.