Swane Küpper
BA Professional Dance '17
My name is Swane Küpper and I completed my BA Professional Dance (BA Dance today) in the summer of 2017, after three years at Palucca University of Dance Dresden. Directly upon graduating, I had the great fortune of getting a contract as an apprentice with the Tanzkompanie Theater St. Gallen in Switzerland. This was followed by a full contract which was even renewed when, in the third theater season, there was to be a change in the direction. The new Director kept me in the ensemble. Meanwhile, I am working under my second direction but already in my fifth season at the Theater St. Gallen.
The time I spent at Palucca University of Dance Dresden has had a lasting impact on my journey to becoming the dancer, artist and the woman that I am today and that I continue to develop into.
On the one hand, the high technical standards and the fact that the focus was not expressly on classical ballet, contemporary dance, or improvisation but rather, on a profound education in all three areas, provided me with the tools necessary for me to be able to use my body as an instrument of expression today.
On the other hand, however, during my time at the University, it was the “soft factors” which provided me with a special view on dance and life in the ballet studio and on stage (and sometimes even beyond). The instructors, each completely different in character but united behind one philosophy. The relationships to them, which in spite of the natural respect which exists in an institution of higher learning, always took place on equal footing. The constant support for us but also the demands on us as students to get actively involved, grab the initiative, to create and shape our own spaces and possibilities for learning and developing. To perceive the multifaceted curricula offered in the study programmes as an invitation to strive for progress with curiosity rather than to fall into despair in face of the unattainability of perfection. It seems that these things sometimes worked well and sometimes less well for me during the three years that I spent in Dresden In any case, it gave me the tools I needed to continually welcome the challenges of today’s multifaceted world of dance, to be open to the various artistic visions and languages of movement and, doing so, always learn something new.
This spirit of the curiosity and openness, this continual questioning of oneself and one’s surroundings and the processes in which one (literally) moves, in order to, please excuse the cliché, “never stop learning” is also what I would give to today’s students and new University alumni for their journeys. According to my experience, learning curves, exactly like most of the things in life, flow in waves. They have no end until the end, but when one succeeds in remaining patient and curious, they move little by little, step by step (towards success).
