Artists

Below the Skin is a dance company founded in 2019 by Aly Khamees and Jelena Mair. Aly is the company’s artistic director and choreographer, while Jelena is responsible for concept and production. Below the Skin’s pieces draw on dance traditions from different cultures and ask what connects people across borders. They are created together with the dancers, who bring their own stories to the work.

At Tanzhaus Zürich, Aly presented the solo Naslah in 2023, inspired by Egyptian street dance with knives. This was followed in 2024 by Empty City, about the City of the Dead in Cairo, where the living and the dead live side by side.

The company opened the season in September 2026 with Rhythm of Reverence. The piece grew out of open workshops. In it, nine female-identifying performers, both professional dancers and workshop participants, ask what remains of ancient rituals.

Aly Khamees and Jelena Mair are Accomplices at Tanzhaus Zürich. Aly regularly leads open workshops there for everyone aged 17 and over, with no previous experience required. What emerges from them feeds into the company’s future productions.

Charlotte Mathiessen is a performer, choreographer and dramaturge. Her work weaves together feminist practice, dramaturgical thinking and artistic creation. Curiosity, desire and anger drive her processes. Charlotte studied contemporary dance at the Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten and then worked as a performer and choreographer for several years. In 2020, she returned to Zurich and completed a master’s degree in dramaturgy at Zurich University of the Arts.

In 2022, she was part of the Show-Off platform at Tanzhaus Zürich. In 2023, she took part in the ATLAS programme at ImPulsTanz with a grant from Pro Helvetia, and in 2024 she was part of PREMIO. Her first full-length piece, night body night voice, was created with Marquis’ McGee, Lilli Unger and Joseph Baan and premiered at Tanzhaus Zürich in February 2025.

Since 2024, Charlotte has also been co-director of Zirkusquartier Zürich, a theatre dedicated to contemporary circus. Charlotte is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Muhammed Kaltuk founded Company MEK in 2017. The company combines hip-hop and contemporary dance with cultural and dance traditions. MEK stands for diversity and has a clear activist and artistic voice. Muhammed was born in Switzerland and grew up in a conservative Turkish family. To break free from his upbringing, he made a name for himself in the Swiss hip-hop scene. At 25, he began his training at the Höhere Fachschule für Zeitgenössischen und Urbanen Bühnentanz in Zurich. There he found his way of working: he develops material from the dancers’ movement repertoire and weaves it together with his own style.

Father Politics was created with Kaserne Basel and COLOURS International Dance Festival Stuttgart. The piece deals with the powerlessness of politics and is touring nationally and internationally. At Theater St. Gallen, Luzerner Theater and Theater Basel, Muhammed made statements on toxic masculinity, origin and territories. In May 2027, MEK will present a new production at Kaserne Basel. Muhammed Kaltuk and Company MEK are Accomplices at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Cosima Grand is a choreographer and dancer. She is particularly interested in the empathic potential of dance. She explores how people resonate with one another through movement and bodily sensations. To this end, she has developed a physical practice based on rocking and trembling movements, which also involves the voice.

Cosima trained in dance at CNDC d’Angers and was a member of Cie Marchepied in Lausanne. She completed a bachelor’s degree in multilingual communication in Geneva and studied theatre studies and sociolinguistics in Bern. Her pieces include CTRL-V (EP) (2nd prize, PREMIO 2015), Restless Beings (2020) and things veer (2023). In 2015, she received the Canton of Valais Cultural Promotion Award, in 2020 a cultural award from the City of Zurich, and in 2026 a Swiss Performing Arts Award.

Time has long been a central theme in Cosima’s work. Her solo Schmerzstück (‘Pain Piece’), which premiered at Tanzhaus Zürich in December 2025, also deals with the temporal dimensions of pain. In Zeitlabor (‘Time Lab’), she invites participants to experience time beyond the clock. Cosima is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Criptonite is a crip-queer theatre project founded in 2020 by Zurich-based artists Edwin Ramirez and Nina Mühlemann. Criptonite’s pieces work with Aesthetics of Access, placing the perceptual styles and experiences of disabled people at their centre. Criptonite’s most recent work, Bioluminescence, premiered at Tanzhaus Zürich in summer 2025, and the piece Pleasure has toured internationally. Alongside stage works, Criptonite also organises community events such as labs, workshops and more. Criptonite received Zurich’s multi-year concept funding for 2024–2027.

Kwangsuk “Issue” Park is a choreographer and performer from South Korea who lives in Zurich. He is the artistic director of the collective eight2one. His pieces combine breaking, contemporary dance, humour and play. In his work, he asks how people participate, how cultural identity emerges and what connects us. Most recently, Kwangsuk has worked with Kaori Ito at TJP–CDN Strasbourg, with James Thierrée and with Below the Skin, among others.

He is currently developing the family production Das Schwingfest with eight2one for children aged 6 and over. Inspired by the children’s song “Mini Farb und Dini”, two performers transform into animal characters, compete in Schwingen, traditional Swiss wrestling, and gradually reinvent the rules of the game. The regular family breaking workshop, which Kwangsuk leads with Hyosung “Cho” Joo at Tanzhaus Zürich, is also inspired by the piece.

Kwangsuk is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Eman Hussein is a dancer, choreographer and dance filmmaker from Cairo who lives in Zurich. Her work is rooted in her working-class background. She explores the relationship between physical labour, movement and contemporary dance. To do this, Eman often spends long periods of time with workers in workshops and workplaces. From this, she develops a “movement alphabet” of repetition, rhythm and asymmetry. In this way, she makes the invisible sides of labour visible in the body.

Her works have been shown at festivals including Zürcher Theater Spektakel, Festival de Danse Cannes – Côte d’Azur and Festival Theaterformen. In 2026, she received the PREMIO award for emerging artists.

Undeclared Work, the third chapter of her series Labour Work – Between Work and Dance, premieres at Tanzhaus Zürich on 9 December 2026. The piece is about people who work on construction sites. In the workshop series Groove Your Labour, Eman invites participants to explore the rhythms and movements of their own working lives.

Eman is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

ugénie Rebetez grew up in the Swiss Jura and has worked as a freelance stage artist since 2010. She has created the solo pieces Gina (2010), Encore (2013), Bienvenue (2017) and Comeback (2025), which is touring Switzerland in 2027. Ha ha ha (2021) is a piece for young audiences, danced by Tarek Halaby. Her other works include the trio Nous trois (2019), the parade Le défilé droit direct du Jura for the Fête des Vignerons, and Rendez-vous (2022).

Eugénie also creates performances in art spaces, for example at Kunsthalle Krems and Kunsthaus Zürich for exhibitions by Pipilotti Rist. For many years, she has worked with the BA Dance students at La Manufacture in Lausanne. From 2024 to 2027, she receives concept funding from the City of Zurich.

Eugénie is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Ivy Monteiro develops figurative works in dance, performance and music. Through fluid forms and characters, Ivy combines themes such as femininity and gender with social and ethnic stereotypes. Ivy is also known as Mother Tropikahl Ivy B. Poderosa, the name under which Ivy produces events for a migrant QTIBPOC audience in Switzerland. QTIBPOC stands for queer, trans and intersex people, Black people and people of colour.

Ivy’s works have been shown at venues including the Museu da Imagem e do Som in São Paulo, the Queer Biennial II in Los Angeles, Les Urbaines in Lausanne and the opening of the Swiss Pavilion at the 2019 Venice Biennale. In 2024, Ivy received a Swiss Performing Arts Award.

At Tanzhaus Zürich, Ivy teaches classes in vogue performance and ballroom, and in autumn 2026 organised the Villains Ball Weekend with Hausvrau.

Ivy is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Jamuna Mirjam Zweifel is a choreographer and performer. She lives in Zurich, works internationally and is committed to community formats in the dance scene. From 2019 to 2023, she worked with the Zurich-based collective The Field, developing short pieces and experimental formats that were shown internationally. She has performed in works by Meg Stuart, Isabel Lewis and Simone Aughterlony, among others.

In 2024, she created her first full-length production, Holes, which premiered at Theater am Gleis in Winterthur. She co-founded Zookunft.Project, which ran from 2020 to 2025. Jamuna has received several grants and awards, including from the Canton of Solothurn in 2019 and the Canton of Zurich in 2025. In 2026, she is at the Atelier Paris at the Cité Internationale des Arts with a grant from the Canton of Solothurn. Her piece Glitch Softcore premieres at Tanzhaus Zürich on 22 April 2027.

Jamuna is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Joseph Baan is an artist and educator. Joseph’s practice combines art, education and collaboration as ways to forge creative survival. At its centre are the complexity of collectivity and the question of how a solidarity can emerge that does not erase difference but affirms it. This gives rise to performances, installations, texts, group works and scores.

Joseph is pursuing a PhD at Zurich University of the Arts and the Mozarteum in Salzburg and teaches critical theory and performance at ETH Zurich. From 2019 to 2022, Joseph co-ran the School of Commons in Zurich, a grassroots initiative for peer learning.

At the end of April 2026, Joseph presented the performance ALL RISE at Tanzhaus Zürich. The piece examines the dramaturgical kinship between the legal system and the theatre, staging a trial as a space of waiting. The roles of witnesses, judges and advocates are shared between audience and performers. As a dramaturge, Joseph also worked on Charlotte Mathiessen’s night body night voice. Joseph is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

The collective dance me to the end is made up of eight dancers, choreographers, dance mediators, dance scholars and body therapists. All of them have worked in dance for many years. They share a great sense of curiosity, an open approach to research and a love of risk. The collective came together in 2023 during a research project on “dance and age(ing)”.

The collective questions ideas about the body and dance and calls for greater age diversity in dance. Together with experts from architecture, research and business, it develops new formats. The aim is to make dancers in their sixties and beyond more visible and to inspire a curious approach to growing older.

The collective’s members are Angelika Ächter, Jeanette Engler, Gisa Frank, Anna Huber, Tina Mantel, Angela Stöcklin, Katharina Vogel and Ivan Wolfe. The eight members are Accomplices at Tanzhaus Zürich. From 23 to 25 October 2026, the collective hosted the conference VERLUST GEWINN VISION! at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Lea Moro works as a choreographer, curator, dramaturge and cultural manager. She brings artistic and social processes together through interdisciplinary and inclusive approaches. Sustainability and cultural accessibility are important to her. Her choreographic works tour internationally. In 2021, she founded the platform Work it Out, which redistributes resources and promotes co-creation.

Lea was a dramaturge at Tanzhaus Zürich and, in 2022/2023, programme dramaturge at Kaserne Basel. Together with Kunst(Zeug)Haus Rapperswil-Jona, she founded and curated the dance festival Date to Dance. Since 2025, she has headed Tanzbüro Basel (IG Tanz), and since 2026 she has been artistic director designate of the inclusive festival wildwuchs in Basel. In 2026/2027, she is working on the choreographic research project Talking About Grief (working title).

Lea is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Lyn Bentschik works as a crip-queer choreographer, (long-durational) performer and dramaturge. Lyn studied contemporary stage dance and performance (BA) at Stockholm University of the Arts and choreography (MA Dance) at Zurich University of the Arts. Lyn’s works move between dance, expanded choreography, performance and visual art.

In 2025/26, Lyn was an Associated Artist with TanzPlan Ost. During this time, Lyn created the group piece Collective Rhythms of Pain about chronic pain. The piece asks what a world would feel like in which no one has to hide their pain for fear of being labelled as ill. The project team brings together artistic work, creative accessibility and lived experience. The piece premieres at Tanzhaus Zürich on 6 November 2026.

Lyn is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

New Kyd is a movement artist, DJ and sound artist who lives in Zurich. Kyd was born in the UK to Nigerian parents and holds a BA in Dance from the University of Roehampton. Kyd’s practice combines movement, sound and abstract storytelling. This practice moves between diasporic identity, ritual and experimental dance performance. The Yoruba worldview from West Africa is an important source. Kyd explores themes such as urban isolation, invisibility, opulence and resistance, and questions Western ideas of independence and visibility.

Kyd was part of the ensemble at Schauspielhaus Zürich and of Trajal Harrell’s Zurich Dance Ensemble. Kyd has worked with artists such as Ligia Lewis, Wu Tsang, Akram Khan and Tiran Willemse and has shown work at venues including Gessnerallee, Halle am Berghain in Berlin and Movement Research in New York.

Kyd is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

P. Piton is a choreographer and performer based between Stockholm and Zürich. In their choreographic work, P. explores improvisation as a form of composition and approaches dance through its ecstatic, sensual power. They trained at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris, La Manufacture Lausanne and Stockholm University of the Arts, where P. recently completed a master’s degree in choreography.

Since 2019, P. has worked within the collective The Field, a space for non-hierarchical, collaborative choreography. Together with Romane Peytavin, they also founded La PP, which created absurd works from playful audience encounters, including Dédicace and Farewell Body. With their own association, Snakes & Stones, P. presented Open/Closed in 2022 at venues including La Bâtie festival in Geneva and the Swiss Dance Days. GOON premieres at Tanzhaus Zürich on 24 February 2027.

P. Piton is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Sarafina Beck is a dancer, choreographer and interdisciplinary artist from Zurich. Since graduating from the Höhere Fachschule für Zeitgenössischen und Urbanen Bühnentanz in 2019, she has worked freelance in Switzerland and internationally. She combines street and club dance styles with contemporary dance, theatre and film. Her works are visual and cinematic. They focus on inner states and the tension between personal perception and social expectations.

In 2020, Sarafina presented her first short piece, SUPERPOSITION, at Gessnerallee Zürich, followed there in 2023 by her first full-length work, TELE(your)VISION. That same year, she was in residence at Brixton House in London as part of Pro Helvetia’s Swiss Connection UK programme. In 2026, STARDUST – A Star Has Died premiered at Tanzhaus Zürich. As a performer, she has worked with Company MEK and Cie. La Ronde, among others. She also makes her own dance films.

Sarafina is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Soraya Leila Emery is a Swiss-Moroccan choreographer based in Zurich. She explores pleasure from an intersectional, decolonial and feminist perspective, and in doing so offers a platform for dancers from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Her earlier works asked how cultural identity is preserved and passed on, and how the female Arab body is represented.

Soraya Leila completed her dance training at CFPArts Geneva in 2014 and at the Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance (SEAD) in 2017, followed by a master’s degree in choreography at Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) in 2024. As an Associated Artist with TanzPlan Ost, she created the group piece TURN ON in 2023/2024. Her solo Coming Soon premiered at Tanzhaus Zürich in March 2026. Inspired by Ingres’ painting La Grande Odalisque, it questions Orientalist clichés.

Soraya Leila is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.

Teresa Vittucci was born in Vienna and has lived in Zurich since 2015. Teresa’s work is rooted in contemporary dance performance and explores feminist and queer perspectives on pop culture, history and religion. Humour and subversive jokes are always part of it. Teresa works solo and with artists such as Colin Self, Annina Machaz and Theater HORA.

The trilogy IN PRAISE OF VULNERABILITY comprises three pieces. For the first part, HATE ME, TENDER, Teresa received the Swiss Dance Award in 2019. In the second part, DOOM, Teresa and Colin Self explore how the figures of Eve and Pandora have shaped the image of the feminine. Teresa premiered the third part, SANE SATAN, at Tanzhaus Zürich in March 2024. All three parts have been shown at Tanzhaus Zürich.

In October 2026, anger angels (ETERNAL LETDOWN) premiered at Tanzhaus Zürich. It is Teresa’s first collaboration with Sophía Rodríguez. In the piece, two angels appear in a strange office and sense people’s anger. Through movement, voice and irony, they transform this anger into something liberating.

Teresa is an Accomplice at Tanzhaus Zürich.