Lutz Förster

Lutz Förster

For forty years, starting in 1975, Lutz Förster danced in numerous productions of Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, both in Wuppertal and on international tours. From 2013 to 2016 he was also its artistic director. He taught at the Folkwang University of the Arts from 1988 to 2019, becoming its professor of contemporary dance in 1991. From 1992 to 2012 he was head of Dance and also head of the Institute of Contemporary Dance.
Lutz Förster studied dance at the Folkwang Hochschule (later Folkwang University of the Arts) in Essen, with Hans Züllig and Jean Cébron among his teachers; he also studied in London and New York under Matt Mattox, Ruth Currier and Zena Rommett. He was a member of the Folkwang Dance Studio under the leadership of Susanne Linke and Reinhild Hoffmann.

After a scholarship in New York in 1981/82, primarily with the José Limón Dance Company, he returned to that company in 1984 as associate artistic director. He danced with them until 1986 in choreographies by José Limón, Lucas Hoving, Merdith Monk, Susanne Linke and Anna Sokolow, among others. He worked with Robert Wilson on productions at the Hamburgische Staatsoper (Cosmopolitan Greetings), La Scala in Milan (Doktor Faustus), and with Sir Simon Rattle and Karl-Ernst Herrmann at the Salzburger Festspiele (Les Boréades). His film and TV performances include PINA by Wim Wenders, the award-winning short film In and Out of Control by Emir Eralp and the 2023 short film Syntax in Space by Fabiane Kemmann, a film about the poetry of sign language and mime.
In 2009, Förster created the solo piece Lutz Förster – Portrait of a Dancer, in which he looked back at his artistic career, especially at collaborations with Pina Bausch, Robert Wilson, and the José Limón Company, with whom he toured as guest artist in Germany and throughout the world (e.g. Berlin, Hamburg, Warsaw, Ferrara, Brussels, Oslo, Gothenburg, Zagreb, Seoul, Beirut and Xalapa).
In 2024 he returned to the stage of Oper Wuppertal with Kontakthof – Echoes of ’78, directed by Meryl Tankard. The production was selected for the prestigious Berliner Theatertreffen in 2025.
Förster was artistic director of the festival Folkwang in Moskau (1993), the Folkwang Fest der Künste (2001) to mark Kurt Jooss’s 100th birthday and, in 2010, of the 2nd Dance Education Biennale within the RUHR 2010 Capital of Culture programme. He was also artistic adviser to Pina Bausch’s Tanzfestival NRW 2004.
Lutz Förster worked as a guest lecturer in many places, including Tanztheater Bochum (Reinhild Hoffmann), Tanztheater Bremen (Susanne Linke, Urs Dietrich), Tanztheater Basel (Joachim Schlömer), Tanztheater Münster (Daniel Goldin), City Contemporary Dance Company (Hong Kong), Modern Dance Theatre (Ankara ), Tanztheater Kassel; in San José (Costa Rica), St Petersburg, and at universities in Mexico City, Austin (Texas, USA), Istanbul, Bogotá, Porto Alegre (Brazil), Nanjing and Dalian (China) as well as at summer schools in Berlin, Munich, Vienna and Jacob’s Pillow (USA). In 2008/9 he held a guest professorship, funded by the DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service), at Universidad Veracruzana in Xalapa (Mexico).
In September 2015 Lutz Förster was awarded the Léonide Massine Dance Prize for lifetime achievement (Premio alla Carriera) in Positano, Italy. In 2023 he was awarded the Deutscher Tanzpreis (German Dance Prize).

Translated by Rachel McNicholl