Collaborations
Anastasia Kostner Dance Choreography Performance Movement
COLLABORATIONS
“Anastasia with her sophisticated craftsmanship in dance and choreography and both a trained and intuitive eye for detail is the utmost inspiring collaborator and rehearsal director. Her leadership is clear and purposeful, yet soft and empathetic. Anastasia’s artistic vision has a timeless and universal quality and the combination of her bright mind and refined dance technique make her a unique and poetic dance artist. Anastasia contributes to any creative and performance process in an indispensable way by bringing quality and care into the collaboration while making everyone around her shine.”
FREMDE FREUNDE / FOREIGN FRIENDS
The work explores how proximity and distance shape our sense of belonging — how we meet, confront, and transform one another. Through moments of tension, empathy, and surrender, two performers navigate the fragile balance between difference and connection.
Set against the backdrop of ongoing migration movements and the violent realities of war, Fremde Freunde becomes a physical reflection on coexistence — on what it means to remain human when faced with separation, displacement, and conflict.
It is a meeting of bodies, histories, and gazes — a search for friendship amid the unknown.
The piece premiered in 2021 and is still currently touring. For further details, contact Anastasia.Kostner@gmail.com.
Concept: Stefan Planker, Anastasia Kostner / Choreography: Anastasia Kostner
In collaboration with Riccardo Meneghini / Light design & visuals: Mirco Lazovic / Commissioned by: Sudetendeutsches Museum München.
Photo: Jona Salcher
SAS MUJEL
Sas Mujel is a site-specific performance created within the context of the Transart Festival in collaboration with composer Eduard Demetz and visual artist Hubert Kostner.
The project transformed the alpine landscape into a living stage. Mountain climbers became performers, moving through the rocky terrain following a choreographic score across the mountains. Their movements unfolded alongside the soundscape created by Ensemble Windkraft, whose musicians were positioned within the landscape itself.
The performance premiered on the Langkofelscharte in Italy in 2019, where dance, music, and the natural environment merged into a temporary artistic intervention in the high alpine setting.
Read the review here:
DOLOMITEN
Photo: Transart
DICTATORSHIP OF LOVE
DOL is a performance by Sandra Kramerova created within the framework of the Nieuwe Makers Regeling 2022-2023. Anastasia Kostner joined the project as rehearsal director and choreographic assistant.
In this production love becomes a command and a challenge. Dictatorship of love is a contest of lovability and endurance, where love is an order, an imposition, something both wanted and feared. This work brings together professional dancers and volunteers on stage, creating a dynamic exploration of imposed affection and resilience.
Photo: Melanie Lemahieu
OCEANUS
Oceanus is a site-specific performance created by the Amsterdam-based company Between two hands, developed collaboratively with dancers who co-choreographed and performed the work.
Guided through a sequence of ritualistic actions, the audience moves through the performance landscape while encountering different physical and sonic compositions of water. The work unfolds as a contemporary ritual, inviting reflection on the relationship between human bodies and the element that sustains life.
The performance was presented at the Over het IJ Festival in the Netherlands in 2021.
Photo: Between Two Hands
PIANO RE-IMAGINED
The performance Re-imagining piano was designed for an audience who wants to experience classical music in a different setting. A performance with live music, live visuals and dance create a 'Gesamtkunstwerk', a world of experiences tackling all the senses. The first pilot was initiated by pianist Katharina Thöni and performed at Bloomsbury Festival in London, from where it then took form in different locations and settings. It was furthermore commissioned by Jeunesse Gherdëina (IT) and performed further under the production of pianist Belle Chen at the Royal Academy of Music Piano Festival and the Bloomsbury Festival in London.
Live visual art: Maarten van der Glas / Piano: Belle Chen, Katharina Thöni, Eva Vinatzer /
Choreography: Anastasia Kostner
Dance: Takeshi Matsumoto, Anastasia Kostner / Visual input: Annlin Caho, Emily Nelson / Sound design: Bas Gebbing, Timothy Tate, Live electronica: Ian Chambers, Dougal Lott
The piece premiered in 2012 and is still in the current repertoire. For further details, contact Anastasia.Kostner@gmail.com.
Link of Bloomsbury Festival: MADEMOISELLE
CONTACT
Together with conTakt percussion group, a repertoire of contemporary musical pieces (as for example ‘Trio per uno’ by Zivkovic) and improvisations were designed, which made the interplay between music and dance visible. The performance was first commissioned by the Jeunesse Festival, Val Gardena (IT) in 2010.
Photo: Christian Miglioranza
L FOVA N IADE
This performance explores how two bodies interpret and embody the same musical score in radically different ways. Sharing the sound world of Canto Diviso by Eduard Demetz, a dancer and a drummer enter a dialogue where music is not only heard, but physically lived.
While the dancer lets the sounds resonate through an organic, fluid embodiment, the drummer — Hannes von Metz — reveals how rhythm shapes and transforms his own physical presence. Movement and sound influence one another, unfolding as a shared yet distinct interpretation of the same musical landscape.
Originally presented during the cultural event Di dla cultura ladina S Martin de Tor in 2025.
Photo: Rai TV ladina
DER WINTER KÜSST UNS - TRAUMVERLOREN, LA DANZA DELLA NEVE
This site-specific performance for the Winter Gardens of the Therme Meran 2021 was choreographed for and performed by an ensemble, creating a multimedia theatre experience in collaboration with Fabrik Azzurro.
Blending dance, theatre, and installation, the audience is guided on a one-hour journey through the park where performers appear along illuminated paths and hidden corners. The work transforms the winter landscape into a magical storytelling environment.
Photo: Kerstin Kahl
ANAM CARA
Anam Cara (Gaelic for “soul friend”) is a duet choreographed and performed with Sanne Clifford in 2020, following their earlier collaboration in Sanne’s site specific work 3 Is a crowd.
The piece explores an intimate encounter between two bodies that mirror and transform one another. Surrounded by musicians and audience in a circular setting, the performance creates a poetic space of shared presence and connection.
MIRROR OF SOULS
Mirror of Souls is a dance film directed by Sanne Clifford, developed from the choreographic material of Anam Cara.
Translating the duet into a cinematic form, the film explores themes of reflection and connection through movement and the camera’s perspective. The film has been screened internationally in Hungary, Italy, Sweden, India, and the United States.
Photo: Sjoerd Derine
ICOSAHEDRONIC
This dance film got shape after first trials at the dunes in the Netherlands, on roofs of London and in the roads of Paris (dance film A'part a Paris), in collaboration with Maarten van der Glas, a complex concept of pixilation, out of which resulted the dance movie Icosahedronic was created. It was screened at the 'Dance Camera West' dance film festival in Los Angeles in 2014.
Photo: Maarten van der Glas
EUROPEADA PROJECT
EUROPEADA PROJECT is a research performance about European minorities. Commissioned by FUEN, Federal Union of European Nationalities, in 2016, this performance embraces 24 minorities and invites them on stage.
Photo: Maarten van der Glas
SCHWER WIE EIN-STEIN
This duets showcases the research of gravity, which gave SCHWER WIE EIN-STEIN its form. Of interest was the kinetic chain of movement that arises, once we let the weight of the head guide. The piece talks about interdependency, waiting and expectations, humor and play. Developed in collaboration with Jungyeon Kim, it was performed at Alps Move (IT) and Sommerwerft in Frankfurt am Main (DE) in 2011-2012.
Photo: Michael Jekel
FRACTALS
Fractals is the second work of the collective 20Finch House, collaborating with Simon Wehrli and Guiomar Campos. Fractals was performed at Canterbury Festival in London and at Alps Move Festival in Italy in 2010 - 2011. Artistic collaborator: Keren’or Pezard / Music: Tomas Tallis ‘In time of’.
Photo: Samuel Runggaldier
SERENITAS
In this choreography, the dancer Iosu Lezameta navigates a journey through various states of being, ultimately seeking silence. Moving beyond conventional physicality, Serenitas celebrates the profound expressiveness of mature, experienced bodies. This solo invites both performer and audience into a shared exploration of tranquility, using deliberate, dynamic movement to evoke a sense of inner stillness and connect with the sublime.
Concept: Iosu Lezameta / Choreography: Anastasia Kostner / Dance: Iosu Lezameta / Costume and stage design: Iosu Lezameta / With the kind support of: Errante Teatro Danza
The piece premiered in 2024 and is still currently touring. For further details, contact Anastasia.Kostner@gmail.com.
Photo: Ainhoa Artola
DANCE SCAPES
The site specific performance DANCE SCAPES goes into an interrelation with the surrounding and integrates itself with the speciality of the space and the people who visit it. Also in digital form, this project has been performed in collaboration with visual artist Irma de Vries at TEDX in Breda and at AlPlanFolkfestival (IT) in 2018.
Photo: Maria Stijger Aramburu
DANCE AND ORGAN
Tanz und Orgel is a chain of several performances, which search beyond the place and music to elate the spectators into a multi-sensorial performance.
Organ: Constanze Schweizer Elser, Margareta Hürholz, Wakako Yamanaga, Christian Rose, Ralf Stiewe / Performed in: Selb, Pforzheim, Stadthagen, Schwerte, Kelkheim, Ahlen, Menden, Hagen, Gießen, Iserlohn (DE).
The piece premiered in 2012 and is still in the current repertoire. For further details, contact Anastasia.Kostner@gmail.com.
Photo: Hanke SN
NOW
Now is a sight specific dance performance. It is a practice, using instant composition, contact improvisation to engage with the architecture and the people of the performance location. In collaboration with Riccardo Meneghini, this project was lounged in 2017 by IDEAtanztheaterperformance (Doris Plankl) and performed at HAP Bolzano and the Alps Move Festival (IT).
Photo: Martin Trafoier
ALICE SYNDROME
'The Alice Syndrome' is a neurological condition that affects perception. Shapes become distorted.The performance takes Lewis Carroll and Alice as its protagonists and offers a collage of dance, theatre, poetry and film. With: Riva Godfried, Judigor Zimmerman Gor, Marieke Helmus, Leah Jacob, Maarten Van Der Glas. Under the supervision of Ammy Kuiper, supported by: Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds and Stichting Stokroos. Premiered at Radion Amsterdam (NL).
Photo: Dipa de Floor, trailer below
ESPERIËNZES
Commissioned by the art institute Tessman Bolzano, the dance solo ESPERIËNZES looks at the theme of cultural identity in a humorous and playful manner. The piece toured further to Circolo val Gardena and Atertheater (IT) in 2015.
Photo: Ursula Tavella
PUBLIC OPINION
This improvisation performance was presented in the frame of Tagung Tanzwelten, Gesellschaft für Tanzforschung, Theater Mollerhaus, Darmstadt (DE), after a first pilot at TAMED Tanzmedizin Symposium 2010, Frankfurt am Main (DE).
