Workshop
Wed, 23 April 2025 | 7 – 9 PM | Un-Label Studio, Hosterstraße 1-5, Cologne
We invite dancers and other interested participants – with and without visual impairments – to join our research residency for an open dance workshop!
Together, we will play with proximity, audience, body, and language – experimenting with physical and verbal interaction by sharpening our senses.
How do vision and sound shape movement and text? And what happens in their absence?
Let’s investigate new ways of perceiving, moving, and communicating — through touch, sound, and presence.
- The workshop takes place in English spoken language.
- Participation is free – please reserve your ticket via rausgegangen in advance.
This workshop is part of the artistic residency Creating the Link, which focuses on exploring the intersection of body language, sensory perception, and the relationship between performers and audiences.
The unique artistic trio – Max Greyson, a leading innovator in artistic Audio Description; Saïd Gharbi, a pioneering blind dancer; and Marje Hirvonen, a choreographer exploring the edges of embodiment – challenges conventional performance and invites audiences into a world where movement is experienced beyond sight.
Marje Hirvonen, Saïd Gharbi, and Max Greyson will be in residence at L.I.K. – Laboratory for Inclusive Culture for two weeks in April 2025.
About the Residence
During the residency, artists Marje Hirvonen, Saïd Gharbi and Max Greyson will explore innovative ways to structure experimentation in space, seeking to create a setup that provides both safety and artistic challenge for blind dancers and blind audiences.
The residency will begin with exploring how external interactions – such as those on the street and everyday encounters – can inspire pure expressions of body language. By alternating between active interaction and passive observation, the artists will allow the world around them to influence their movement practice, focusing on gestures and commonly used verbal expressions. They will examine which aspects of body language are shaped by culture or social norms and which are uniquely individual. How aware are performers of their own nonverbal communication? How can Audio Description (AD) support and enhance their creative process?
A key aspect of the residency will be investigating physical and verbal interaction, focusing on the senses and examining how vision and sound relate to movement and text. The artists will also explore the effects of sensory and physical absence.
The final stage of the residency will focus on the relationship between performers and their audience. The artists propose that proximity to the audience creates intimacy, which fosters a richer flow of information and greater access to imagination. External participants will be invited to engage in the process, trying out different tools and contributing to the research through observation and interaction.
Artists
Marje Hirvonen
Marje Hirvonen is a choreographer, performer and artist. Born in Finland, she studied dance at the University for Music and Dance Cologne and later completed a Master’s in Performance Making at Goldsmiths, University of London. Her work operates at the intersection of performance and activism, exploring themes such as queerness, desire, and the political body. Her performances have been presented internationally, including Die Masse (Goethe-Institut Bangalore), Against the Current (documenta fifteen), and Like, really cunt (Heidelberg Queer Festival). In 2023, she won the Cologne Women’s Theatre Prize for her concept anna. Her latest project, MATUA, a multimedia video installation, was created in collaboration with a Tanzanian street dance company. In addition to her artistic practice, she also works as a co-curator.
Saïd Gharbi
Saïd Gharbi was born in Morocco and moved to Belgium with his family in the late ’60s. He became blind at the age of 14. As a young adult, Saïd met Flemish choreographer Wim Vandekeybus / Ultima Vez in 1992 while studying at the Brailleliga. After numerous collaborations with Vandekeybus (1992-2001) Saïd founded the company ‘Les BGM’ and created several dance-theatre pieces together with Ana Stegnar. His solo performance Clair Obscur (Les BGM, 2015) was directed by Ivan Vrambout. In 2016, Saïd joined Ultima Vez again and performed in Mocumentary of a Contemporary Saviour.
For more than a decade, Saïd has been involved in dance and theatre projects in Belgium and abroad (France, Germany, the Netherlands). He has worked as an actor and/or dancer in various productions for cie Acajou, cie La Coma, Dries Verhoeven. Recently he participated in two short films Music for Bat Caves and Isomo project.
In recent years, Saïd has participated in pedagogical projects, teaching at Down the Barriers (2013, Tunis), Atelier de transmission pédagogique et d’échange artistique (2014, Antananarivo, Madagascar), Festival de Marseille, Danse et arts multiples (2015), Capacitas (2015, Barcelona) and Festival Potfiction (2016, Germany). Saïd also facilitates workshops on raising awareness of visual impairment for various associations.
Max Greyson
Max Greyson is a poet, performer and theatre maker from Antwerp. He tours Flanders and The Netherlands as a solo spoken word performer and he is a core artistic member of Un-Label. Max Greyson became vice-champion at the Dutch National Championships of Poetry Slam in 2015 and a year later his debut collection of poems Waanzin went niet was published by De Arbeiderspers. In 2019 his second collection Et Alors was published by the same publisher, as well as his debut novel Een waarschijnlijk toeval in 2021 and his third poetry collection Dramaturgie van het loslaten. Since 2019 he has been appointed artistic researcher at the Royal Antwerp Conservatoire. In his research projects ArtInAD and Speaking Figures, he develops methods for the artistic integration of audio-description for blind and visually impaired people and other forms of “Aesthetics of Access” in contemporary dance and music theatre. He is also the artistic director of ARType vzw, a company that creates music theatre productions, co-produces socially relevant artistic projects and supports artists to develop their inclusive practice.
About the residence programme by Un-Label
Un-Label’s artist residencies provide artists with disabilities with the opportunity to realise their own creative projects while receiving targeted support. The Labor für inklusive Kultur (L.I.K.) in Cologne serves as a central space where artists with disabilities can connect, collaborate, and work in an inclusive environment. In addition to financial, personnel, and logistical support, the residencies focus on interdisciplinary and intersectional collaboration. Un-Label also partners with cultural networks to establish accessibility and long-term support for artists with disabilities within the arts sector.
