Frankfurt Lab

The Net We Carry – Wavu Tuliobeba
by Tadhi Alawi & Samwel Japhet (Tanzania)
ca. 50 min.

This multidisciplinary dance performance is an invitation to look at what we carry, feel its weight, and consider what we might choose to release or carry differently. The performance happens, because there are things we inherit, experience, and carry with us long after the moment has passed. Some are spoken about. Others remain buried in the body, passed quietly from one generation to another. Family histories, expectations, violence, pain, loss, love, and frustration became the starting points for the movements.
On stage, Tadhi Alawi and Samwel Japhet move between personal and collective experiences through dance, voice, text, visuals, and music. Inspired by the energy of the streets and the relentless pulse of Singeli music, the performers turn tension into movement, struggle into rhythm, and resistance into sound. Through their work, they ask what it means to survive, to remember and to imagine something beyond what we have inherited. The body becomes a place where different stories meet, where what has been hidden can surface, shift, and be transformed.
At the end of their residency at the Frankfurt LAB, Tadhi Alawi and Samwel Japhet are showing a version of the performance that is very close to how it will premiere at the KUYUM Tanzplattform at Uferstudios Berlin on 16th September, 2026.

Concept, Choreography & Performance: Tadhi Alawi and Samwel Japhet
Dramaturgical Support: Philipp Scholtysik
Original Music Composition: Shabani Mugado
Featuring Singeli Sound by: Matua TZ
Photography & Video Projection: Jimmy Mathias
Production: Nantea Dance Company

Content & Sensory Notes: Addresses sexual violence against children, sudden loud noises
Language: English and Swahili

Peace at Home
by Rıza Efe Reis (Turkey)
ca. 30 min.

This performance reconstructs the WhatsApp group used by soldiers involved in the failed coup attempt in Turkey on 15 July 2016. The chat interface appears as both archive and stage. Messages, notifications, timestamps and reconstructed exchanges become dramatic material, through which military coordination, technological mediation, and the instability of historical narration are examined. The chat of the coup is re-performed through a custom-built browser interface, that the audience will access through their own phones. Digital infrastructures shape the way political events are experienced and remembered.

Inspired in part by Aeschylus’ “The Persians,” one of the earliest surviving dramatic accounts of a military defeat, the performance moves between documentary reconstruction and speculative alteration. At times, the historical chat is allowed to unfold as archived; at other times, its messages are modified, rewriting an event whose outcome is already known.

At the end of the residency at the Frankfurt LAB, “Peace at Home” is shown as a work-in-progress.

Created and performed by: Rıza Efe Reis
Dramaturgy: Philipp Scholtysik

Accessibility Note: One needs a smartphone to fully experience the performance.
Language: English

Artist Talks & Snacks

How to Build a ________
by Ching Chu (Hong Kong)
ca. 30 min.

Drawing from everyday tool operation and physical hardware labour, “How to Build a ________” (work-in-progress) explores the collision between the body, technical skill, and gendered expectations. Combining task-based actions, material exploration, and a workshop-like stage, the piece presents the female body as operational and knowledgeable. The creative process will continue in Hong Kong, to develop it into a finished performance to be premiered in December 2026.

Concept & Performance: Ching Chu
Dramaturgical inputs: Philipp Scholtysik
Lighting and Technical Support: Philipp Kehder, Ruth Süpple

Content & Sensory Notes: strobe-like light effect, loud noise
Language: English

Meeting Point (first run)
by Laura Margarita & Diego Hernández A. (Chile)
ca. 30 min.

Sometimes you need a little distance to see something clearer. At the beginning of their research Laura Margarita and Diego Hernández A. asked, what traces theater would leave in the world, if it wasn’t practiced anymore. This starting point led them to think about memory as something evolving, that is as much a matter of the body as is of the mind. In “Meeting Point” the two artists experiment with aesthetic strategies between exhibition and performance. On a site-specific tour, the audience is invited to look at common objects differently and to wonder, what theater could have been.

Accessibility Note: The performance is accessible with a wheelchair, if the wheelchair is no wider than 96 cm.
Language: English

What if My Father was a Hero
by Fatima Meroueh (Lebanon)
ca. 30 min.

During her residency at the Frankfurt LAB, Fatima Meroueh investigated violence, death, and tragedy, drawing parallels between the story of her father and the figure of the tragic hero. In her work-in-progress showing, she draws on stories, myths, and fragments surrounding the house in which she might have grown up, while embodying a childhood fantasy of being both the investigator and the villain. She explores the absurdity of the ways memories of those who have passed away are altered to fit personal, familial, and political narratives. When inherited narratives become theatrical material, imagination can precede reality and the weight of reality might become more bearable.

Direction, Text, Performance: Fatima Meroueh
Dramaturgy, Co-Direction: Philipp Scholtysik
Light Design, Technical Support: Philipp Kehder, Ruth Süpple

Language: English

The international residency programme Frankfurt Moves! is a collaboration between the foundation KfW Stiftung and the Frankfurt LAB. It aims to support the contemporary performing arts by promoting international emerging artists individually and fostering artistic exchange and intercultural dialogue. The encouragement of transcultural dialogue is one of KfW Stiftung’s highest priorities, an independent, non-profit organization. The Frankfurt LAB is a vital performance and producing space for contemporary performing arts and music, which supports emerging artists and encourages a productive exchange between dance, choreography, performance, theatre and music.

The residency programme Frankfurt Moves! invites performing artists who were trained in Africa, Asia, Latin America or the WANA-region to work in Frankfurt for one month. Additionally, the artists are supported remotely for another month. In 2026, applications from more than 59 countries were entered in an Open-Call. An expert jury chose five groups to develop their work in the professional venues of the Frankfurt LAB from 20 July to 16 August 2026. Moreover, the residency included a fee, costs for travel, accommodation, as well as dramaturgical and technical support. Last but not least, the artists had the opportunity to meet with the local cultural scene, adding to its diversity.