National Performance Network

The NATIONAL PERFORMANCE NETWORK is a support program for the exchange and distribution of contemporary dance or theater productions in Germany. It supports independent theaters, private theaters, city and state theaters, festivals and other cultural institutions and companies who work as presenters and would like to invite dance or theater productions from a different German federal state.

Support for guest performances

In 1999, NPN Guest Performance Support for Dance was introduced by six German dance presenters: Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin; JOINT ADVENTURES, Munich; Kampnagel Internationale Kulturfabrik, Hamburg; Künstlerhaus Mousonturm, Frankfurt am Main; Theater im Pfalzbau, Ludwigshafen; and tanzhaus nrw, Düsseldorf. Since then, the objective of this support initiative has been to present dance productions and make them accessible to a wide audience in Germany. In 2009, NPN Guest Performance Support for Theater was established according to the Guest Performance Support for Dance model.

The NATIONAL PERFORMANCE NETWORK can support programmers from public venues with 25% of the guest performance costs; private venues receive up to 35%. Impulse support programs are granted to a different federal state every year. In the context of impulse support, presenters from the selected states, but also those from other states, can invite the artists or groups from the selected federal state to a guest performance and receive up to 50% of the guest performance costs.

Coproduction Support

In the context of Tanzplan Deutschland, an initiative of the German Federal Cultural Foundation established for five years, NPN Guest Performance Support for Dance was expanded to include a Coproduction Support program in 2005. When Tanzplan Deutschland was completed, this support also ceased to exist, but was extended for another year with the assistance of the German Federal Cultural Foundation. The NPN Coproduction Support program supported coproductions within Germany and with international partners in the field of contemporary dance. It closed the structural gap between the activities of the Fonds Darstellende Künste and the General Project Support granted by the German Federal Cultural Foundation in the fields of dance and performance; in the future, it must receive a permanent place in the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media’s budget!

Public Support

The NATIONAL PERFORMANCE NETWORK is kindly supported by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, by 14 Departments of Culture and Arts of the German federal state: Baden-Württemberg, Bayern, Berlin, Brandenburg, Bremen, Hamburg, Hessen, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Niedersachsen, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Sachsen, Sachsen-Anhalt, Schleswig-Holstein (only Theater) and Thüringen.