Tarek Assam

Tarek Assam (born May 6, 1962 in Penzberg ) is a German-Egyptian ballet director and choreographer . Since 2002 he has been ballet director and chief choreographer of Tanzcompagnie Gießen / Stadttheater Gießen , artistic director of the TanzArt ostwest festival in Gießen and curating director at the European level of the Greater Bay Music & Dance Festival in Shenzhen / China. Since 2017 he has been the spokesman for the Federal German Ballet and Dance Theater Directors Conference BBTK .

Life and education

Tarek Assam was born in Penzberg / Upper Bavaria . As the son of a diplomat, he was already active on international soil as a child. After graduating from high school in Bonn , he first studied philosophy, sociology and pedagogy at the Friedrich Wilhelms University there , but after a few semesters switched to the Cologne University of Music and Dance , where he graduated with a degree in stage dance.

Artistic stations

Tarek Assam was engaged as a dancer at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein Düsseldorf, the Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden and the Stadttheater Pforzheim . In 1990 he was also employed as an assistant and training manager at the latter, where he presented his first choreographic works from 1991. After successfully participating in various choreographic competitions, he was hired as a choreographer at the National Theater El Salvador in 1993 .

In 1995 he took over the management of the International Dance Week Eisenhüttenstadt and was engaged as choreographer and ballet director at the Nordharzer Städtebundtheater in Halberstadt and Quedlinburg from 1995 to 2003 . His choreography of a multimedia event on the occasion of the opening of the 639-year-long organ art project ORGAN² / ASLSP by John Cage , which was commissioned by the John Cage Foundation in 2000 and 2001 , brought him first national attention .

From 2001 to 2004 he was invited to the Varna State Opera in Bulgaria as a choreographer . Since 2002 he has been ballet director and chief choreographer at the Stadttheater Gießen and subsequently received teaching positions at the universities of Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Beijing, at the Texas State University , the Università Aldo Moro in Bari and repeatedly at the Justus Liebig University in Gießen . He initiated and is responsible for the integration of (European) contemporary dance into the curriculum of dance education at the Shenzhen Art School in China.

In addition to his work as a ballet director and choreographer, he has been a project manager for educational projects on several occasions, including the IGS-press yourself educational project, which was funded over two years in the Tanzfonds Partner of the German Federal Cultural Foundation . He also leads a cooperation project between the Gießen dance company, the KROKI eV association for chronically ill children and the Psychoanalytic Family Psychosomatics Department at the Giessen University Clinic.

He is regularly asked for jury activities, including at the Solo Dance Theater Festival in Stuttgart , the Roma Dance Contest , at dance competitions in Bari , Pescara and Novara , at Dance Planner Co., Ltd. in Korea and at the Shenzhen Art School in South China. He is also a member of the jury in the TanzLand / Fond program for guest performances by the Federal Cultural Foundation .

He is a member of the Presidium of the Federal German Ballet and Dance Theater Directors Conference BBTK and was elected its spokesperson in April 2017. In this function he represents the BBTK in the Council for Performing Arts and Dance in the German Cultural Council and the German Stage Association .

Dance company Giessen

Tarek Assam has been ballet director and chief choreographer at the Stadttheater Gießen since 2002 and heads the Gießen dance company. He is responsible for a large number of new creations of contemporary dance evenings which, when dealing with social or political issues, often fall back on ancient or classical motifs and repeatedly expand the boundaries of narration and composition. He conducts artistic exchange and joint projects with various international ballet and dance companies. The Gießen dance company has made guest appearances in Poland , Belgium , the Czech Republic , Italy , the USA and the PR China . The Gießen dance company is often a welcome guest at international dance and ballet galas.

Under his direction, the Gießen dance company has worked with renowned guest choreographers such as Rui Horta, Jacek Przybyłowicz, Pascal Touzeau, Phillip Taylor, Jörg Mannes, Daniel Goldin, Henrietta Horn, Dominique Dumais or James Wilton and many others. Different artists from the fields of design / stage and costume design complement (t) their creative potential, including Ana Baer, ​​Fred Pommerehn, Gabriele Kortmann, Lukas Noll, Colin Walker, Imme Kachel or Bernhard Niechotz. Composers such as Markus Stockhausen, 48nord, John Psathas, Moritz Eggert, Lines and Rhythm, Nik Bärtsch or Robert Luczak also work (te) n with the Gießen dance company.

TanzArt east-west

As early as 1997, while still at the Nordharzer Städtebundtheater , Tarek Assam, together with the theater scholar Mechtild Hobl-Friedrich, conceived the Tanzart ostwest Festival , which now has a network of around one hundred international companies, collectives and solo artists and based on the model of guest exchange based. Under his direction, the festival initially took place in Halberstadt , Quedlinburg , Magdeburg and Herford , before moving to Gießen in 2002 . Around the Whitsun days, around 30 international companies make guest appearances there, which - supplemented by site-specific performances, exhibitions and workshops - present the diversity in contemporary dance . Assam has been a founding member and chairman of TanzArt ostwest eV based in Giessen since 2015. Long-term partners who also organize events within the framework of the festival are the ballet at Theater Koblenz or the Compagnie Irene K. from Eupen / Belgium . Since 2018 the festival has been cooperating with the Greater Bay Music & Dance Festival in Shenzhen / China , for which Assam has been appointed curating director at European level.

Prices

• 2004, Culture Prize of the City of Varna / Bulgaria for the choreography "The Wall".
• 2013, International Friendship Prize of the 3rd China Xinjiang International Dance Festival in Urumqi for the choreography "Macbeth".
• 2019, Gießener Theater Prize denkmal of the Friends of the Theater in Gießen eV association for his choreography of the scenic concert "Surrogate Cities" by Heiner Goebbels as well as for his commitment to dance theater and the regional and international networking of his company.

Web links

• Profile on the side of the Stadttheater Gießen
• Homepage of the dance company Giessen
• Homepage of TanzArt ostwest