Potsdamer Tanztage - international festival for contemporary dance 2026

The festival Potsdamer Tanztage, German for Potsdam Dance Days, was first held in 1991, the year the fabrik Potsdam was also founded as one of the first places for contemporary in former East Germany. The festival have been held annually in May/June ever since. It forms a cultural highlight in the contemporary cultural landscape of the state capital Potsdam and the region and radiate nationally and internationally.With a curation geared towards innovation, participation and accessibility, the festival is, as it were, the only internationally oriented dance festival in Brandenburg and one of the most well-known and impulse-giving dance festivals in Germany. Every year, the festival presents national and international choreographers and dance ensembles on different stages in the city, in open-air performances and at unusual locations in the city, thus providing direct and up-close insights into current trends and developments in contemporary dance and into the aesthetic, intercultural and thematic diversity of one of the most dynamic contemporary art forms.Some of the works can be co-produced or supported together with partners from European dance networks.The festival presents internationally successful artists as well as new discoveries and debut works from all over the world and, since 2020, increasingly from the Berlin Brandenburg region.Programmatic highlights among many others have been artists and ensembles such as Lia Rodrigues (Brazil), Eun-Me Ahn (Korea), Elle Sofe Sara (Sápmi, Norway) Aina Alegre (Spain), Yoann Bourgeois, Martine Pisani, 12_Mehdi Kerkouche (all France), Yasmeen Godder (Israel), Daina Ashbee (Canada), Oona Doherty (Ireland), Marco da Silva Ferreirra (Portugal), Omar Rajeh (Lebanon), Isabelle Schad (Germany) or deufert&plischke (Germany).Through low-threshold and audience-oriented offers, dance in urban spaces, at unusual locations and site specific or also through participatory performance projects, the Tanztage programme always attracted an audiences of various backgrounds, experiences and age and reaches a professional audience as well as the participation of audiences with no or very little experience in dance.In addition to the performances, there is an annual workshop programme of up to 30 courses in a wide range of dance techniques, somatic practices and forms of body and movement work that make practical dance and the art of movement tangible and thus create opportunities for professional qualification as well as lifelong learning.