CEREN ORAN – Artistic Direction, Dance & Choreography
"In my experience and opinion, dance & movement has a bigger power in society than just being an art form. It is equally touching, contagious and moving for the audience as well as for the dancers. Unfortunately, Contemporary Dance is presented and portrayed in a limited elitist frame most of the time. The audience profile is limited, although the art form itself has the potential to touch anyone and be very accessible for an every day audience. I feel that we as dance artists, have to open up in order to inspire people to get connected with their bodies and different physical qualities. We can trigger them with our bodies by using dance and movement as a strong form of expression. Especially nowadays, after the lockdowns where people have lost their habits of going to theatres, performances and concerts; it is even more important to find and invent new formats to encounter the audience. With this in mind, my wish is to take the next step and to plan long term programs and visions, creating an artistic and infrastructural team under: Ceren Oran & Moving Borders “
Ceren Oran was born in Istanbul in 1984 and moved in 2006 to Salzburg to study contemporary dance at SEAD (Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance). Since finishing her postgraduate masters program ICE at SEAD, she has been working as a freelance dancer, choreographer and soundpainter.
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She has worked with many multidisciplinary artists for her own projects such as “Who is Frau Troffea?” (2019), “RUSH HOUR” (2017) and “Heimat...los!” (2015) in Munich, “Youmemeyouhesheme...” in Vienna (2013) or “Arrimamuebles” in Costa Rica (2010) and all around Europe and America. She has also danced for many choreographers and international companies including Davis Freeman (US/BE), Tomaz Simatovic (SLO/Ö), Mihran Tomasyan (TR), Mustafa Avkiran (TR), Abhilash Ningappa (IND), Gosaval Gaspard Projects (CR), Toihaus Theatre (AU) etc.
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As of 2010, she started creating performances for young audiences. She tours internationally through Europe, Africa and Asia on various occasions with her pieces Schön Anders (Munich 2020), Fliegende Wörter (Munich 2019), Elefant aus dem Ei (Munich 2017), SAG MAL … (Munich 2016) Yamuk Yemek (Istanbul, 2015), Cartoonville (Strasbourg, 2013) and “Trag mich!” (Salzburg 2010 / Premiere BMUKK, STELLA nomination 2011 – Production: Toihaus Theatre).
Ceren started to build a career as a Soundpainter and Soundpainting trainer in 2010, which allows her to explore multidisciplinary free improvisation and compose live 'in the moment' improvisational material on the stage. As a multidisciplinary Soundpainter and a member of the Soundpainting community, Ceren Oran had the opportunity to lead many workshops and projects in various countries and cultural contexts, including conservatoires, schools, refugee centers, festivals, art and education symposiums such as: Assitej Artistic Gathering (NO), Arts Space For Kids (CN), Tarapaca Music Festival (CL), Flying Carpet Festival (TR), Staatstheter Kassel (DE), Polyphonica (GR), Social Circus Festival Mardin (TR), Orff-Schulwerk-Symposium (AT), Symbosium “El Sistema (AT), SEAD Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance (AT)). She received in June 2015 an award "Soundpainting as an Integration Project" from Austrian Federal Ministry of Education and Women's Affairs for her project with the Primary School Josefiau – Salzburg. Click to see her Teaching Experience
Since 2014 she is based in Munich where she works in close collaboration with Tanzbüro München as well as Fokus Tanz / Tanz und Schule e.V. She is a member of Tanztendenz München e.V. as well as one of the founding and board members of the global network under Assitej International: Young Dance Network.
AWARDS & RECOGNITIONS
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2022 Fördertanzpreis München Jury Begründung
2019 Next Generation Residency Participant - Assitej Artistic Gathering Norway - Kristasnad
2018 Work Scholarship for the research "Why do we dance?" - Kulturreferat München
2018 Next Generation Residency Participant - Assitej Artistic Gathering China - Beijing
2016 Work Scholarship for Soundpainting Projects in München - Kulturreferat München
2015 Soundpainting as Integration Project Cooperation Award - Bundeministerium für Bildung und Frauen Österreich
2015 Artist of the Month (April) - Bundeszentrum für schulische Kulturarbeit Österreich
2014 Erasmus + Lifelong Learning Fortbildung Foundation
2013 Grundtvig Lifelong Learning Fortbildung Foundation
2011 Startscholarship 2011 for Music and Performing Arts - BMUKK Bundesministerium für Unterricht,Kunst und Kultur
2011 Trag Mich!.. Nomination Best Children Performance, Nomination best Music - STELLA 2011
2011 1. Preis mit dem Kurzfilm: Missão:Construção Perfeita - Toshiba Portugal Short film Competition
2010 Trag Mich!.. Special Award - BMUKK Bundesministerium für Unterricht, Kunst und Kultur
2008 Fullscholarship Participant - 17. Int. Bühnenwerkstatt / Dancetheatre festival Graz
Karolína Hejnová - Creative Producer
“I‘ve had the chance to experience Ceren’s work from different perspectives: first as a curator inviting her to Prague, later as a dancer in „Who Is Frau Troffea?“ and since the last 11 months as a close collaborator supporting her artistic path. In my eyes, she constantly moves the borders of what contemporary dance can be and challenges the common perception of who can be its audience and where and how long it can be presented. I feel privileged developing these challenges with her on a long term and help thus making wishes and dreams happen.“
After graduating from the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, she has been working as a freelance producer and dancer since 2010. For more than 9 years she was closely associated with Studio ALTA / ALT@RT in Prague, Czech Republic, where she managed the program,
international activities and the educational program. Since 2015, she has been running her own production company danceWATCH. The productions represented by danceWATCH have been presented at important European festivals e.g: Maison de la Danse in Lyon, Aerowaves Spring Forward, Brighton Festival, Edinburgh Fringe Festival, as well as in Japan (Tokyo, Kanazawa, Aichi) and New York City (APAP Festival). She was awarded "Manager of the Year" at the Czech Dance Platform 2016. Since 2018 she has been living in Munich for family reasons and is more oriented towards the German dance scene. She has been working with Ceren Oran since 2019, first as a dancer for the "Who Is Frau Troffea?" project, then as a tour manager and consultant for international activities.Since 2021 they founded together Ceren Oran & Moving Borders Dance Company, and have been working closely together with the desire to establish a long-term artistic cooperation and exchange.
Roni Sagi – Dance, Puppetry & Choreographic Collaboration
“One of the things I find magical about my collaboration with Ceren, is that the process she creates is not compromising in any way, what we experience together as we are creating the piece is a very important part of the process and therefore the outcome is a very deep and well thought peace. I believe that's why so many artists how work with her, share a personal experience. What we create together is inspired by our audience, we wish to communicate with them when we are on the stage and also when we are not if it is through a workshop or a talk about the piece. Through the artistk work we aim to speak in eye level with are young and older audience”
Roni Sagi was born in Jerusalem/Israel in 1988 and studied at the Hasadna Be Haifa. He continued his studies at the SEAD (Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance) in Austria, where he attended performance and dance classes and perfected his creative talent in
building puppets and puppetry in general. In the past years, Sagi worked for Sven-Eric Bechtolf, Ann Yee, Doris Uhlich, Hubert Lepka, Simone Forti and Jerome Bel. He collaborated with Ceren Oran and performed since 2016 in Sag Mal …,Elefant aus dem Ei, Who is Frau Troffea?, Fliegende Wörter, Schön Anders and Stories in Blue in Munich.
Jin Lee - Dance & Choreographic Collaboration
“Ceren is the first Choreographer that I started working with as a freelancer. After performing our first project <Who is Frau Troffea? I made myself a clear statement. "I will walk my path following people who create works for human beings." Each company member has the purest heart but has wise brains. I believe That's the strength of Moving borders.
Jin Lee (South Korea, 1993) is a dancer and a choreographer based in Munich and Berlin. She received a diploma in dance from SEAD Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance (AT, 2019), and received a Bachelor of Dance from Dongduck Women's University (KR, 2016). She graduates from university with the highest grades. As a dancer, she worked with amongst others, Ceren Oran, Milla Koistinen, Jasmine Ellis , Georges Maikel, Eulalia Ayguade Farro,
Pilgyun Jeong, Ingri Fiksdal, Rotem Weissman and Julyen Hamilton. As a choreographer, she received Debütförderung from München Kulturreferat in 2022. Together with Jihun Choi, she worked on the piece . HUABUN will be presented in Hochx theater in April 2023.
Rotem Wiessmann - Dance & Choreographic Collaboration
My first project with Ceren Oran was ‘The Urge’ I was touched and inspired by Ceren’s clarity, the confidence she instills on the dancers and awareness she has as a choreographer, she has unusual sensitivity, particular sense of listening to team and to the needs of the piece, suggesting a bright vision, but open for a deep exploration. I’m learning from her about leadership, responsibility of her team, profound research, handling situations, huge wisdom and heart.
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Rotem Weissman is an Israeli choreographer and dancer, based in Germany. received a diploma in choreography from the International Choreographic Exchange postgraduate program at SEAD Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance, and was invited to the Artist In Residence one-year program at SEAD. Rotem’s work includes, amongst others, “BAUHAUS”
(Premiere 2018), which won a prize at Machol Shalem Dance House - Jerusalem International Choreography Competition performed at PerformanceTag Festival and in Fringe Festival – Stoff; “AGADA” (Premiere 2022), performed at Acker Stadt Palast, Dock 11 and Habait Theatre; “Yellow Poetry” , which performed at Jerusalem International Dance Week (2019, IL), Studio Bank and AltoFest The Urge”, Rotem is involved as co-choreographer and dancer with the choreographer Ceren Oran, which performed in various locations across Europe.
Jihun Choi - Dance & Choreographic Collaboration
“Ceren Oran is the choreographer I first started working as a freelancer. When I danced to her project (The Urge) I realized that her work moved and attracted people's hearts.
Through this experience, while working more with her, I felt that I wanted to impress more people with her choreography and my dance. This is the only reason I want to work with Ceren Oran & Moving Borders. Each employee of the company is pure and wise and has their own dance language that attracts people. That's the power of this company.”
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Jihun Choi (south Korea, 1990) is active as a dancer, choreographer and contemporary dance teacher. He received a Bachelor of Dance (2015) and Master of fine Art (2018) from Sejong University (KR) where he currently studying for a Doctoral Degree of Modern Dance (2018 -
present). As a dancer, he worked with, amongst others, Hyungnam Kim (Running 2020) Pilgyun Jeong(Story 2020) Janghyun Ryu(I Don’t Want Die 2018) Hyunkyung Lee (Weight 2018) Wonmin Shin(Breath 2017) - in South Korea. Currently, he is working with Ceren Oran(The Urge 2021) (Fliegende Wörer 2022) As a choreographer, he created “3 Idiots”(2018) and “Move Gallery”(2018), which performed in South Korea and co-created “Movement”(2019) with Gyujin Kim. He is currently created “HAUBUN” with Jin Lee in Germany.
Jovana Zelenović - Dance & Choreographic Collaboration
“Ever since i finished my professional education I have been collaborating with Ceren, therefore she played a huge role in my creative and artistic development. She is persistently bending the rules in many terms but what I specifically find inspiring is her constant need to question what dance means to nowadays audience and how we can use it as a tool to communicate. It’s very fulfilling to be surrounded by the team such as Moving Borders, as they keep me challenged and moved.”
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Jovana Zelenović was born in December 1996 in Belgrade, Serbia. At a young age she started her training in different sports alongside studying music and piano. In 2015, Jovana started her education at SEAD (Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance) as a scholarship
holder, where she had an opportunity to learn and work with many artist such as Julyen Hamilton, Meytal Blanaru, Milla Koistinen, Lali Ayguade, Eleonore Valere Lachky, Jos Baker Guy Nader along the others. After graduating she became a member of Zagreb Dance Company (2019-2022). Meanwhile being a company member she was nourishing her own artistic language. From January 2022 she started her journey as a freelance artist. She was part of projects Who is Frau Troffea, Schon Anders and Stories in Blue.
Benny Omerzell – Composition & Performance
"I've been working with Ceren Oran & Moving Borders for about 3 years now and look forward for many more in the future. I appreciate immensely that I'm always part of the development from the very beginning and don't have to write my music to a finalized choreography. This makes it a fulfilling dynamic process, where I can react to the dancer's movements through improvisation and let the music grow simultaneously with the piece. It also helps a lot that Ceren and I share a similar aesthetic understanding of music, so I'm always able to make music I love."
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Benny Omerzell lives and works as a freelance musician, composer and animation filmmaker in Vienna, Austria. He plays the piano and keyboards in the internationally acclaimed bands 5K HD, Kompost3 and Lylit and writes music for theatre, dance, documentaries and many
more. He's been working with Ceren Oran since 2019 and composed the music for "Schön Anders", "Stories In Blue" (in collaboration with Milly Groz) and most recently "Tei&Len".
Hüseyin Evirgen - Composition
“I have been working with Ceren for more than a decade. There are three important points I enjoy and appreciate the most when I collaborate with Ceren. The first one is her musicality, how she can deep listen to music and adjust the moves, music, story and scenery on each other perfectly. The second one is her structural way of composing yet still very open to new ideas. The third and the most important one is how humane compassionate she is with all her co-workers around. I’m looking forward to work with her for many more years.”
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Hüseyin Evirgen, he studied composition there and completed his studies at the Mozarteum University. He lives and works in Berlin and Vienna, where he works creatively at the interface between theatre, dance, video and performance and performs at home and abroad: Aspects
Festival (Salzburg), International Mediterranean Contemporary Music Festival (Istanbul) or 4D Sound ( Amsterdam). In addition to Austrian composition funding, in 2007 he received the “Electronics Land Prize” from the state of Salzburg, and in 2008 he took part in the Red Bull Music Academy in Barcelona. As an electronic musician he was represented in the Austria pavilion at the Expo Shanghai in 2010. He is part of the producer duo CASSEGRAIN and "MAGNA PIA" as a solo artist. In Munich he performed the music of Heimat...los!, The Urge, Rush Hour and Who is Frau Troffea? composed.
Tuncay Acar – Composition, Performance and Concept Development
"Through the invitation of Ceren Oran i had my first encounter with childrens theatre. As a musician you always play a subtle role on stage, but playing for small children changed my approach to music completely in terms of gaining back my natural naivety and learning to value it. I am interested in evolving and exploring my craft through interaction with performance and dance arts.”
The Munich based cultural activist, networker, organizer, blogger, dj, promoter and musician lives as a german citizen with turkish roots between Munich and Istanbul. In Istanbul he started his studies in Classical Archeology at Istanbul University, which he finished at Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich. From the beginning of the 90‘ties he is active as a musician
and organizer in Munich and is developing the cultural diversity in his hometown. In order to achive this, he is leadingboard member of a couple of cultural associations: Real München e.V. and Glockenbachwerkstatt e.V.. He also was co-initiator of the cultural intervention plattform and club Import Export. His blog www.triptown.de is online since 2011. From playing season 2020/21 he is involved in the content of the performance space Habibi Kiosk which is a part of the municipal theatre Münchner Kammerspiele. Tuncay Acar is a member of Moving Boarders ensemble since 2016 and is currently touring with the childrens dance theatre plays „Sag mal…“ and „Elefant aus dem Ei“.
Gudrun Plaichinger - Composition & Performance
"Ceren Oran is a great artist whose visions come true in wonderfully great children's and evening pieces and open up new paths. Due to her artistic clarity, her high musicality, structured determination, her happiness and humanity, working with her is rich in further development, experiences and inspiration in an incredibly positive working atmosphere.
I am very happy to have been able to work with her for many years and to appreciate the mutual trust that has allowed us to grow into a good, creative team."
Gudrun studied concert violin and baroque violin in Linz, Salzburg and Vienna. Studied music and instrumental music pedagogy, piano and singing. She works internationally in various areas of music as an acting and performing musician. She composes music for numerous
children's and evening plays in the theaters. She is organizer of the festival of improvisation - !improvize! !install!. The typical focal points of her tonal language are improvisation, the extra-natural, breaking down boundaries and diversity through wild combinations.She is a member of the Ceren Oran & Moving Borders company, the Kollinski collective, the Toihaus Theater and an electric violinist and singer in the group deneb and in the trio PRO.
Jean Baptiste Charlot – Dramaturgie, Research & Concept Develpment
“I’ve been working with Ceren Oran for almost ten years, and I know anytime she will propose to collaborate on a project, I will answer: YES! Everytime we worked together, in different artistic and pedagogical landscapes, she initiated a deep collective process in which generosity, trust and boldness were the main ingredients. Everytime, I felt what mattered was the encounter of individualities who create together a common space to explore new territories, new paths. Finally, what comes out of these creations is always for me a surprise and a great joy.“
Jean Baptiste Charlot is a musician and dancer. He studied philosophy (Masters 2004) and graduated in music theory, composition, flute, jazz and chamber music. As a trained sound painter, he practices multidisciplinary composition and site specific performance with
numerous different ensembles. He is also part of Soundpainting founder Walter Thompson's real-time composition think tank community. Charlot founded the ZAB Company Zone à Bricole, with which he developed Site Specific Performance in Nancy between 2010 and 2014. His interest in movement led him to study butoh dance with Camille Mutel and Masaki Iwana, as well as working with the physical theater method at Viewpoint. His other dance practices led him to bodyweather (Frank van de Ven) or to contact improvisation (Adrian Russi, Didier Silhol). Oran and Charlot developed together and worked on The Urge, Who is Frau Troffea, Tracks, Relationshifts and many research and soundpainting projects around the world.
Sigrid Wurzinger - Stage and Costume Design
“I have valued working with Ceren Oran & Moving Borders for a long time. We inspire each other and can make the seemingly impossible possible and visible to others. In a pandemic where physical touch has become rare, Ceren Oran manages to embrace her audience with her approach to theater work.”
Sigrid Wurzinger (AU) is a free-lance costume- and set designer. In addition to numerous productions for Toihaus Theater Salzburg, where she also staged her children piece “C...wie Chamäleon”, there are a lot of collaborations with the international dance company “Ceren Oran & Moving Borders”. Her work has taken her to Munich and to Junges SchauSpielHaus Hamburg, among many other places.
Lisa Risch (Rat & Tat) – Artistsic Production Management
"It was a pleasure for us to work with Ceren Oran & Moving Borders on their complex projects, so we at Rat&Tat Kulturbüro are very happy to continue this collaboration and to be part of the artistic team of Ceren Oran & Moving Borders. We are excited about the projects Ceren is working on and are particularly excited about the long-term planning of a dance company that option funding can make possible.”
The Rat&Tat Kulturbüro is a collective of people who work in the field of creative production, we are production managers, producers, dramaturges, networkers and press representatives. Founded in 2012 by Laura Martegani and Katrin Dollinger, the Rat&Tat Kulturbüro now includes a permanent team as well as long-standing collaborators and newcomers. Together
we are committed to cultural projects and collegial cooperation in the independent performing arts. We think, plan, structure, find solutions and the right team, communicate, mediate and design. In short, we ensure that productions run smoothly and thus work with a large number of artists in different areas of the independent performing arts. Ceren Oran is one of the artists supported by the Rat&Tat Kulturbüro as production manager; together we have worked on a number of projects since 2018: Who is Frau Troffea? (2019), Beautifully Different (2020), The Urge (2021) and Stories in Blue (2021)