ABSTRACT
The question that interests me is how I deal with the history of dance if my standard of comparison is the original. I never saw Mary Wigman dance, nor Dore Hoyer, nor the Ballet Russes. What does it mean if I go into raptures over a dance that I have seen only as a stage event? This question may seem to be beside the point, and yet I would like to raise it. The key experiences that have led me to continue to occupy myself with dance – by writing about it, launching periodicals, and organizing festivals – these experiences are closely bound up with artistic personalities, such as Kazuo Ohno, Gerhard Bohner or Koffi Kôkô, or institutions, like the Rubato Dance Company, the ballet productions of William Forsythe and the Tanztheater/Dance Theatre of Pina Bausch. To this day these performances are for me an endless reservoir of energy.
