Soya the Cow, Joseph Baan, Company MEK / Muhammed Kaltuk, Ivy Monteiro

A sex-positive, feminist and vegan drag creature, breaking the binaries of gender and species. Soya the cow dances, sings and speaks for the liberation of everybody. She breaks the boundaries of gender and species and stands up for a world full of joy and compassion. Since her first appearance at the Animal Rights March on the steps of the legendary Volksbühne Berlin, she has taken part in discussion panels and demonstrations. She performs in various artistic contexts and forms, from her theater show Dear Human Animals (2020) to her electro-pop album Purple Grass (2021), in TV shows such as The Voice of Germany (2021), in the exhibition format Planet Moo (2022) or online in social networks. And at Tanzhaus Zürich, for example with performative walks centered around the topics of the dance pieces created there as well as other, independent specials.

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Joseph Baan is an artist and educator. Their practice engages in art, education and collaboration as ways to forge creative survival. They’re interested in the complexity of collectivity and in the possibility of establishing a solidarity that does not homogenise, but affirms difference. They make performances, installations, texts, group works, collaborative formats, and scores that aim to unpack the problem of relating, shifting roles and readings of power and control in relation to affect and reciprocity.
 

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Muhammed Kaltuk founded Company MEK in 2017 to provide a strong framework for his art and creativity. The company develops productions that blend Hip-Hop and contemporary dance, cultural, and dance traditions. MEK stands for diversity and has a clear activist as well as artistic voice. Their movement language is strong, powerful, and unique.

FATHER POLITICS – in collaboration with Kaserne Basel and the COLOURS International Dance Festival Stuttgart – explores the powerlessness of politics and is currently on a national and international tour. Kaltuk makes clear statements on issues that concern him and society, addressing themes such as "Toxic Masculinity" at Theater St. Gallen, "Origin" at Luzerner Theater, and "Territories" at Theater Basel.

Choreographer Muhammed Kaltuk was born and raised in Switzerland in a conservative Turkish family. As an effort to break out of his upbringing, Kaltuk made a name for himself in the Swiss Hip Hop scene. At the age of 22 he had his first production experience at a theater and recognized it as a possibility to find his own voice, as a way to artistically deal with the world. At the age of 25 he started his dance education at the “Höhere Fachschule für Zeitgenössischen und Urbanen Bühnentanz” in Zurich. His goal was to further develop his movement from his background in Hip Hop, but also to get to know and use other dance qualities and styles. That is where he discovered his passion for composing and creating material from the movement repertoire of the dancers he works with, expanding the boundaries of these dancers and intertwining it with his own style and aesthetic ideas of dance. This has become his signature way of working as well as the socially critical, political and personal themes in his creations.

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