Artist Training - Course: Performing Arts
Artist Training / Access Art Schools Berlin
15 to 26 September 2025: Basic tools for a new start in the Berlin performing arts scene by Maryna Makarenko & Anna Volkland
For artists and cultural professionals from diverse areas of the performing arts – like performers and actors, dancers and choreographers, performance makers, directors or dramaturges – who were at risk in their home countries and moved to Berlin, we offer a rich 2-weeks training program to support the start of a new career path in and connection to the diverse performing arts scene of Berlin.
The joint training program will comprise at least 18 hours of input, workshops and excursions (up to 4 or 5 hours a day), and additional one-to-one mentoring sessions to focus on individual questions and advice within the time frame of our program. Faciliators Maryna Makarenko and Anna Volkland both have many years of experience in teaching (also in the frame of the UdK’s Artist Training) and work in the performing arts themselves, as freelancers or in theatre institutions.
Programm:
In the beginning we will focus on physical (somatic practice based) mini-workshops as well as on theoretical (fact based) input, allowing the group to get familiar in our ‘classroom studio’, to get an overview of the performing arts landscape in Berlin (and Germany), benefit from the exchange of all participants’ different experiences and questions, and practise how to present one’s own artistic position in front of others. Connected to the theoretical input we’ll have practical and playful workshops on topics as: navigating Berlin’s funding systems, understanding the application processes for grants and open calls, building collaborations inside the freelancing scene, but also with venues, theatres and festivals, and leveraging one’s immigrant background as a (maybe not so) unique asset within Berlin’s dynamic (and international) art scene. We’re also going to reach out, and each of the two weeks we’ll have a guided visit in one of the many venues and theatres of Berlin (as Gorki theatre or Sophiensaele Berlin), meet some of their staff members (like program managers), get to know how they invite artists to work with them (as guests or staff) or to (co)produce and/or present their works, and we also want to watch at least one performance together. On the last day (26/09/2025) we’ll give space for a final small show-and-share-event of the participants to present and discuss (using appreciative feedback methods) first ideas or drafts for possible projects to the group and for personally invited guests.
Monday 15/09 11:00-15:00
Getting to know the group & Introduction; movement warm-up and 1st theoretical input
+ mentoring session 15:00-18:00 Anna Volkland
Wednesday 17/09 11:00-15:00
2nd theoretical Input; guided movement session; Practical Workshop I
Friday 19/09 Sophiensaele Berlin, Sophienstraße 18, 10178 Berlin
15:30-17:30 guided visit and talk
18:00 residency showing
20:00 performance “Fourth Eye, 4.40 AM” by Ceylan Öztrük (10 Euro for each ticket)
Monday 22/09 11:00-15:00
3rd theoretical Input; guided movement session; Practical Workshop II
+ mentoring session 15:00-18:00 Anna Volkland
Our excursion to Studio ? at Maxim Gorki Theatre will be on 23rd of September.
Friday 26/09 11:00-14:00 SHOWING & SHARING
Presentation/exchange and discussion/feedback of own artistic projects within the group (personally invited guests are possible)
+ mentoring session with Maryna Makarenko by individual arrangement
Venue: Universität der Künste Berlin, Hochschulübergreifendes Zentrum Tanz Berlin (HZT), Uferstraße 23, 13357 Berlin, Studio 3 (first week) and Studio 10 (second week)
Please apply with CV and portfolio until 8 September 2025.
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About us
Facilitators are Anna Volkland, dramaturg and researcher, and Maryna Makarenko, Ukrainian-born multidisciplinary artist and performer. Both have been lecturers and supervisors in the Artists Training program already: Anna since 2016 and until 2020 (partly together with Anis Hamdoun), Maryna between 2022 and 2023 (together with Nora Amin). They also lead a project week together in the frame of Kollisionen 2025 in UdK Berlin - *Center for Witchcraft as an Anarchist Technique for Subversion* - which was such a good experience that they like to teach and create space for other artists to learn and develop together again. Both are sensitive about discrimination and know how to deal with cultural differences. They speak English, German and Ukrainian. Working in Berlin since 2009 respectively 2011, both of them can offer a broad network in the performing arts field in Berlin and Germany, including international contacts.
ARTIST TRAINING is a consulting and further education program at the Berlin University of the Arts for artists at risk. The aims are to network in the cultural and creative industries as well as in the UdK Berlin, to qualify for strategic positioning in the respective artistic field and to provide advice on further professional development. Since 2016, a total of 54 basic and in-depth courses have offered information and contacts to over 800 participants from the following sectors Music, Visual Arts, Performing Arts, Film and initially also Cultural Journalism. 2020 - 21 Educational films, workshops, excursions and advice on basic topics were offered at three other locations (Babelsberg, Hamburg, Hanover). Parallel to this, series of events and podcasts on institutional transformation processes were created.
The project Access Art Schools Berlin in cooperation with the Hochschule für Schauspielkunst Ernst Busch is funded from April to December 2025 by special funds for participation for refugees, Senate Department Berlin.
More information:
www.udk-berlin.de/ziw/artisttraining
www.facebook.com/artisttraining.udk.berlin
artist.training
