Dina Khuseyn is a choreographer and dance activist. She graduated in Ballet from the Choreographic Lyceum (Moscow), Dance Academy Rotterdam, and EX.E.R.CE program in experimental choreography (France) under tutor Mathilde Monnier. Since 2005, Khuseyn has been producing works in the realm of contemporary dance, performance, and contemporary art. Often involved in collaborations with artists, directors and theorists, she also initiates her own platforms, festivals, and research projects. Recipient of scholarships from Jardin d’Europe, DanceWEB, and American Dance Festival. She has worked with renowned choreographers as a dancer, including Tino Sehgal, Loïc Touzé, Anouk van Dijk, Philippe Jamet, Regis Obadia, etc. Her own pieces have participated in many European, American, and Russian dance festivals. Based in France since 2009, Khuseyn visits Moscow while working on projects there.
Lina Puodziukaite-Lanauskiene started her career in dance at Theater AURA, which was the first contemporary dance theater in Lithuania partially funded by the Kaunas municipality (a status gained in 1995). She later studied contemporary dance in the US before returning home to continue her professional dance career at AURA, as well as working on other independent projects. In 2011, she became the head of the Ballet department at the National M.K. Ciurlionis School of the Arts (where she remained for five years) and in 2014 became head of the Contemporary Dance Association in Lithuania. She currently works as a choreographer (mostly independent projects) and dance teacher as well as participating in projects such as the analysis of the dance field in Lithuania and guidelines for dance education in professional and university programs.
Petra Hauerová graduated from the Duncan Centre Conservatory Prague, received a study scholarship at Contemporary Dance School, The Place, London, and studied at the School for New Dance Development, The Theatre school Amsterdam. She teaches choreography and improvisation at the Duncan Centre Conservatory. From 2010 to 2015 she also worked in the management of the conservatory. Since 2008, she has been working on professional dance commissions She currently teaches at the Theatre Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, in the field of Directing Devised and Object Theatre (master’s program for foreign students), where she teaches movement analysis, the use of somatic methods and improvisation for creative collaboration with directors in devised form. She is researching dramaturgical approaches in dance and performing arts.
Sanna Rekola has been director at Dance Info Finland since 2005. She has a Masters in Philosophy from the University of Turku, Turku (Finland) and is currently working on a PhD at the University of Jyväskylä, Faculty of Social Sciences, Cultural Politics Study Program. Her previous roles include: production manager Helsinki Festival, Helsinki (Finland), 2003–2004; Project Manager at the Finnish Dance Information Center, Helsinki (Finland), 2002–2003; producer at the Finnish National Gallery, Contemporary Art Museum Kiasma, Helsinki (Finland), 1997–2003. From 2005 to 2006, Rekola was a Lecturer in Cultural Politics and Arts Management at Helsinki Polytechnic Stadia, Helsinki (Finland).
Inta Balode is a dance writer, curator, and dramaturge at the Latvian Dance Information Center (Riga, Latvia) who calls herself a dance politician. Since 2004, Balode has been curating dance projects, including seminars for artists, journalists, and managers as well as a mini festival called “New Dance in a New Place.” While working as a dance expert at the State Culture Capital Foundation and jury member at the annual theater prize, she managed to lobby for the status of contemporary dance. She is a member of the Latvian Dance Council—a consultative group at the Ministry of Culture. The main issue she, as a dance politician, stands for is trying not to stand for anything too stubbornly. As an outcome of caring about geographical, mental, and emotional peripheries, in 2017, Balode together with co-thinkers from Latvia, France, and Finland established the international non-profit organization LAUKKU. Since summer 2018, she has run the Latvian Dance Information Center.
Annika Üprus has a BA in choreography, but rather than creating art, she dived into creating conditions for the evolving contemporary dance scene of Estonia in Priit Raud’s team (2001). She has witnessed the non-profit organization promoting contemporary dance grow into an independent venue Kanuti Gildi SAAL—presenting curated programme, offering residencies and co-producing local and international artists, organizing a variety of festivals and other thematic events. All this in constant transition along with the natural development of the merging art forms, she is currently dealing with performing arts in general, working with the experimental and innovative in-between and cross-disciplinary artists. Since 2017, she has been challenged with the role of curating festival SAAL Biennaal (former August DanceFestival, est. 1996). Currently exploring MA studies of curatorial practices at Estonian Academy of Arts, Institute of Art History and Visual Culture, she is charmed and inspired by ever-searching restlessly curious artists.
