Sorry Not Sorry

For the 10th anniversary of the “Fokus Tanz” festival, the dance dramaturges at Kampnagel in Hamburg have put their power of decision-making and the conventions of festival curation up for debate. This year’s festival edition is entitled “Sorry Not Sorry” and strives to break with the normative expectations of dance from a non-disabled perspective. To this end, Kampnagel is collaborating curatorially with the queer, crip* (disabled) artist Dan Daw and his company Dan Daw Creative Projects, which is managed and operated by disabled persons.

The festival invites queer, disabled persons to participate onstage, backstage and attend as audience members. The goal is to establish a new norm – if only temporarily – which emphasises mutual care, intersectional accessibility and queer practice in relation to everyday life, family, relationships and intimacy. The project regards “disability” as both visible and invisible impairments, neurodivergence and chronic illnesses which may not be so readily recognised as such. The festival hopes to create a space for anti-ableist and anti-capitalist resistance against a tendentially authoritarian, performance-oriented majority society.

During an extended run of two weeks, the festival will present artistic, queer crip* productions from Germany, Europe and North America. The festival will be interrupted for a “Restival Day” to allow the participants to relax and regenerate. The architectural collective Disordinary Architecture (UK) has been commissioned to design the festival grounds and create unconventional spaces to lie down, move, be loud and be quiet.

Workshops, discussion formats and a “crip meetup” will allow participants to network, engage in dialogue and take part in professional training. An artist-in-residence programme will offer insights into the processes and production of queer crip* art. In order to strengthen the local scene, two open calls are explicitly directed at queer crip* artists living in Germany.

Artistic participants: Dan Daw Creative Projects, Sophia Neises, Rita Mazza, Unusual Symptoms, Disordinary Architecture, Shrouk El Attar, Jerron Herman and others

Festival, Kampnagel, Hamburg: 21 Feb. – 2 Mar. 2024