A lone figure on the edge of the stage silently switches from one pose to the next, toying with our expectations. Iconic and ordinary images are strung together in a dramaturgy that subtly embodies what it means to uphold a place, a pose, a representation. Maria Hassabi allows for a coalescence between the strength and vulnerability of her stage presence – of being exhibited and exposed. Through her own distinctive style of silence, slowness and aesthetic precision, the choreographer invites the audience to develop their own references to the unfolding showcase of iconography. What happens when the process behind an image is revealed? Does it lose its appeal when we compare it to the expectations that we set in our image-saturated contemporary culture?

Maria Hassabi has been developing performances and live installations for more than two decades. Her works provide reflections on concepts of time and representations of the human figure. She uses a variety of media to emphasise the subtleties of formal organisation.

Sat 25 04 2025    20.30 h
Sun 26 04 2025    20.30 h

What lies beyond dance and beyond the body? “Anda, Diana” transforms the body into a revolutionary instrument that questions (bodily) norms and defies prejudice and prevailing social assumptions and aesthetics.

In the award-winning performance “Anda, Diana”, presented at Radialsystem as a Berlin premiere, the dancer and acrobat Diana Niepce offers an intimate look into the process of her self-reconstruction after a fall that led to an irreversible spinal cord injury. In a radical dialogue between body and mind, logic and chaos, the choreographer lets the dancing body emerge and encourages us to challenge bodily norms and counter normativity with new aesthetic values. The disability – although existent – does not represent a victim of the system; on the contrary, this body positions itself as revolutionary outside the norm.

Part of the project “Anda, Diana” is Diana Niepce’s eponymous autobiography: an introspective work developed through painful and personal experiences and shaped by the artistic perspective of the author.

Fri 25 04 2025    19 h
Sat 26 04 2025    19 h

Embodied Practices: Diana Niepce „The Knowing Body“

The aim of the workshop “The Knowing Body” is to develop techniques for deepening embodied knowledge and re-articulating the body as a state of potential. Thinking about the body from the inside out and learning to understand its becoming and changing creates pathways to conceive of its identity differently and define it as a story and manifesto. “The Knowing Body” focuses on improvisation, how space can be perceived and utilised, and the gaze that makes ideas of a hybrid body possible – ideas that can find their place on the stage in ironic and sarcastic ways.

In parallel to the collective development of non-normative dance and body practices, “The Knowing Body” offers a space to think about the possibility of a “good practice”. What could an ethical and democratic dance practice look like? What should be considered in dance communication? “The Knowing Body” is a creative process in a political and identity-related context. Participants are encouraged to think about (artistic) creation in relation to its social relevance, history, genealogy, and urgency.

Sun 27 04 2025   16 h

Lake Life is a piece of science fiction fantasy that takes place in a spectacular dream world. Here, any kind of transformation seems possible, and the delineations of what it means to be human are expanded. Explicitly curated for a multi-generational audience, Kate McIntosh’s immersive performance stages its Berlin premiere at Radialsystem in mid-February. Through guided encounters, audiences blur the line between the imaginary and the real, celebrating the power of imagination and altered self-awareness, and carving out space for playful reinvention.

Building on the success of her participatory works “Worktable” and “In Many Hands”, McIntosh has created another immersive and interactive environment. Using the space onstage, audiences of varying ages are invited to embark on a journey of discovery. The space encourages continuous self-reflection and fosters a change in perception of oneself and others. The performance offers a platform for a wide range of encounters and interactions between different age groups—adults and young people—who want to explore their world. Adults who are are not accompanied by young people are just as welcome as any young person from age 10 and up.

Sat 15 02 2025     18:00 h
Sun 16 02 2025     14:00 h
Sun 16 02 2025     18:00 h

We touch the world with our hands. Our touch creates relationships of closeness and intimacy and simultaneously makes us aware of our separation from the world. Now, our touch is increasingly mediated by technologies that are changing the ways we experience ourselves and others.

The performance Hands Made by choreographer Begüm Erciyas, presented at Radialsystem as a Berlin premiere and as part of the series “Conjunctions – Acts of being in relation”, invites us to rethink our relationship with our hands, to imagine how it has changed throughout history and what their role might be in a future society.

In the performance “Hands Made”, the audience’s hands are at the centre of the show. Viewers are asked to watch their own hands and those of their neighbours, creating an effect of both intimacy and alienation. Separated from the rest of the body, our hands become the focal point of a reflection on craftsmanship, tactile perception, and touch. What have these hands been engaged in? Who or what will they touch in the future?

Sat 08 02 2025     from 16:00 h
Sun 09 02 2025    from 15:00 h

The immersive concert “generating realities” by drummer Philo Tsoungui and The String Archestra – the only ensemble in Germany that specializes in works by BIPoC composers – combines computer-generated music, string instruments and live electronics in a multimedia walk-through sound space.

Loss of friction, glitch, clash: Drummer and producer Philo Tsoungui plays with the translation between digital and analogue media, in both directions. Her computer algorithms generate music for The String Archestra from recorded sound samples of string instruments. In the performance, Tsoungui manipulates the live music with electronic tools. Fragile sounds of string instruments collide with futuristic noise collages – mechanical computer music encounters human spontaneity.

During the performance at Radialsystem, which Tsoungui developed during her fellowship at Beethovenfest and will premiere in this context in September, listeners can move freely around the musicians. The room is bathed in projections of shapes and colours that respond to the movements of everyone in the room.

Nocturnes for a Society invites audiences to weave a nocturnal sonic tapestry, a blanket they can wrap around themselves to drift off into an extraordinary sleep, whilst the sounds of the city can be heard in the background.

Myriam Van Imschoot and Lucas van Haesbroeck’s performance enfolds the audience in a poetic soundscape over the course of a summer night, marking the start of Radialsystem’s new series “Conjunctions”, a programme dedicated to the poetry of “being in relation”. The immersive sound experience of “Nocturnes” continues throughout the night, stretching into the early hours of the morning. The audience are active participants in an environment akin to an oasis of light, shadows, sounds, fabrics and dreams, opening space for associations and creating both an individual and shared experiential world.

Sound artist Myriam Van Imschoot and set designer Lucas van Haesbroeck draw on the legacy of American composer and sound activist Pauline Oliveros as well as the myriad traditions of communal “sounding” that people have always used to forge relations with one another. The audience plays a crucial role in this; they interact with each other, with objects and the space in accordance with a score that yields unexpected textures and atmospheres in a natural and nearly casual way. A soundscape for a deep sleep emerges from this collectively generated soundtrack – the nocturne takes on a life of its own and slumbers on through the night in its various phases and cycles of rest.

Fri 26 07 2024 20:30 h
Sat 27 07 2024 20:30 h

The performances are preceded by two “Embodied Practices”, whose foci are, respectively, felt production as a shared practice and the voice as a medium of community building. These two exchange sessions make up the next instalment in Radialsystem’s series of “Embodied Practices”, which collectively explore forms of preserving and transmitting corporeal practices from different cultural contexts.

→ Embodied Practices: Felt-Session
→ Embodied Practices: Voice-Session