Artistic and integrated audio description – aesthetics of access
Thursday, April 4, 2024, 11 a.m. – 4 p.m., Munich
Studios of Halle 6, Dachauerstraße 112d, 80636 Munich

From April 2 – 4, 2024, the congress “artistic and integrated audio description – aesthetics of access” will take place at the Kreativquartier München. The choreographic duo Rykena/Jüngst and Anna Donderer are inviting various internationally active artists and activists with and without disabilities to reflect together on accessibility in theater and, in particular, to research the topic of integrated audio description. The invited experts will also address the question of how solidarity can be prioritized in independent theater work and how supportive and sustainable alliances can be created. Over the three days, around 25 experts from the field will come together, including artists Sophia Neises, Nina Mühlemann von Criptonite, das Kollektiv Quiplash, Zwoisy Mears-Clarke, Naomi Sanfo, Tanja Erhart, Melanie Hambrecht, Manuela Schemm, Monique Smith Mc-Dowell, Pernille Sonne, das Kollektiv [In]Operabilities, Ursina Tossi, Damini Gairola, Irene Giro, Anna Wieczorek and Katharina Senk.

After the participants share their working approaches and practice with each other on April 2 and 3, the doors will be opened on April 4 to invite you, the interested public, to learn more about the topic and exchange ideas with the artists. There will be discussion rounds and short workshops in which the different practical approaches can be presented and tried out.

Please register for participation on April 4 via e-mail to reservierung@rtkulturbuero.de

No previous knowledge is required to participate on April 4. Please bring comfortable clothing.
The event will be held in German and English.

Access information:
Audio description. Access worker on site. Rooms accessible without barriers. No accessible toilet, but wheelchair friendly. Please allow enough time to find your way around the Kreativquartier site, or let us know if you would like to be picked up at the Leonrodplatz streetcar stop.

Artistic directors: Carolin Jüngst, Lisa Rykena
Artistic co-director: Anna Donderer, Rat & Tat Kulturbüro
Collaboration on accessibility and aesthetics of access: Pernille Sonne
Creative Producer: Pamela Goroncy, Stückliesel
Press and public relations: Simone Lutz

LISTENING

Artistic Audio Description in Contemporary Dance and Performance

Naomi Sanfo | Lisa Rykena & Carolin Jüngst (Munich/Hamburg) 

Workshop

November 3^rd, 2023 | 12:00 noon – 3:30 pm

Choreographic duo Rykena/Jüngst and performer Naomi Sanfo share their ideas and experiences in the artistic handling of audio description as well as their power critique therein through this workshop. Audio description in dance is the language and voice-based description of that which is happening on stage – the description of bodies, movement, and situations. It is the access device for a blind or visually impaired audience to experience theatrical events. In a combination of theory and practice, creative ways of artistic audio description shall be tested to translate dance and performance into a descriptive language and sounds. The workshop participants will be both protagonists as well as descriptors.

Workshop combining theory and practice on the artistic use of audio description.

Sign up HERE

Listen to the podcast HERE

Podcast launch from July 2023

What does it mean to incorporate accessibility as a form of artistic expression in your own work? What are aesthetics of access? What do we mean by artistic audio description? In what different ways can movement, bodies and what happens on stage be described with words? And how do we integrate these descriptions into the artistic work? We invited some experts on these topics to talk to us about it. You can listen to the resulting podcasts or read them as a transcript.

LISTENING Night
Wednesday, 12. Juli 2023, 18 – 21 Uhr
Listening to podcasts together with drinks, snacks and coziness
At Theatre HochX

On a Wednesday evening in July, we invite you to join us for a podcast LISTENING. We’ll make ourselves comfortable with some drinks and snacks and listen to the first two episodes of our LISTENING podcast.

Based on the production SENSE OF WONDER by the choreographic duo Rykena/Jüngst (performances July 21-23 at HochX Munich), the workshop leaders Pernille Sonne, Lisa Rykena and Carolin Jüngst will share ideas and experiences about the artistic use of audio description and their power-critical approach. Audiodescription in dance is the linguistic and vocal description of bodies, movements and situations and everything else that happens on stage. It is the means of access for blind and visually impaired audiences to participate in theatrical events. In this workshop, structured as a kind of research lab, participants will be able to try out different tasks and proposals to translate dance and performance into descriptive language and sounds – both as actors from the inside and as descriptors from the outside. In the first part of the workshop Pernille Sonne will give a practical, theoretical and playful introduction to the topic of audio description of contemporary dance and performance. In the second part, practical scores from the production SENSE OF WONDER will be tried out.

Place: Atelierhaus PLATFORM, Kistlerhofstr. 70, im 3rd floor with elevator

Time: Samstag, 15. Juli 2023, 11 – 17 Uhr

Sing up: anmeldung@rtkulturbuero.de

Pernille Sonne:

Voice and movement are the central elements in the work of Pernille Sonne. The graduated speech artist and actress went blind due to a retinal disease and is involved in many different inclusive projects, including language education, direction, performance and dance. „To move in space and spaces“ is aim and basic idea of her work. Together with Armin Petras she wrote the piece „Close your eyes and fly“ in 2004, in which she acted and danced in the main role. This piece was also the first including a dance choreography for which an audio-descriptions was broadcasted. Today the native Danish lives in Leipzig, where she works at the Schauspiel Leipzig as author for audio-descriptions among other projects.

Currently she dedicates herself to the exploration of various channels of perception. In her work with Xenia Tanika as well as with Jan Burkhardt she focuses on researching new access points and forms of shared conscious. Aim is to leave the form of mere description and to move towards the experience of invisible, but palpable and perceptible spaces and to witness them together, blind or seeing.