Patrick Grigo

Dancer, Choreography, Dance Teacher

Patrick Grigo was multiple world and European champion in hip hop and breakdance (associations: ESDU, IDC, WCOPA) from 2004 to 2006, set his first world record for the Guinness Book of Records in 2007 and opened the Hanover Fair in 2009 as a soloist with a brilliant stage show in front of 2600 invited guests from politics and business. During his active time he performed on many big stages, fairs, galas and events such as FIBO, IFA or BREAD & BUTTER in Berlin. He danced and travelled to many countries and was a guest in London, Las Vegas, New York, Sydney, Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Bangalore or Vienna, among others. He represented fashion brands such as PUMA, Timezone, New Era or AND1 at big shows and as a testimonial.

In 2010, as part of an advertising campaign, a picture of his world record attempt on the twall was sent into space on the Russian Soyuz capsule and circled the globe for almost 6 months in the ISS.

For some years now, his main focus has been on supporting young people. In his two dance schools and those of his partner companies, he therefore focuses everything on the intensive promotion of children and young people in the field of dance. As an ambassador for education and training for the Chamber of Crafts or also various education fairs, he advocates for more education and awareness. At international dance festivals and workshop tours, he teaches professionals and, above all, dance and sports teachers with his specially developed educational concept in urban dance.

Patrick Grigo has already been involved in previous educational art projects at Tanz & Kunst Königsfelden.

Valentina Pedica

Dancer and Dance Teacher

Valentina Pedica, born in Fabriano, Italy, is involved in the 2022 project as a dance teacher as well as a dancer.

She studied dance at the IDA Ballet Academy in Ravenna and completed her ballet and contemporary studies in Madrid at the Real Conservatorio Profesional de Danza Mariemma. She has been a dancer with Dantzaz Konpainia since 2013 and has worked with renowned choreographers such as Itzik Galili, Lukas Timulak and Jacek Przybylowicz. Further engagements already took her to Switzerland in 2015 for several Tanz & Kunst Königsfelden productions and to Madrid for the Elephant in the Black Box Company. After studies all over Europe, she became a member of Celli Contemporary Ballet in Rome in 2012. In 2013 Valentina won 1st prize at the Spoleo International Dance Competition. She performed in the dance film "Motion Games" by Lucas van Woerkum and Ruben Van Leer (NL) (choreography by Lukas Timulak, Nederlands Dans Theater).

Bálint Dobozi

Music Composer

www.balintdobozi.com

The Hungarian-Swiss composer, producer and performer Bálint Dobozi is at home in the area of tension between electronic and acoustic music. Growing up in a classically influenced home, but also with the eclectic pop music of the 70s and 80s, music has always been an open concept for him. Many years of piano and drum lessons in classical and jazz. Entry into electronic music at 16, first record releases and live performances with club music and hip-hop projects in the mid-90s. Today he produces music for film, stage and the dancefloor in his studio in Zurich, tours half the world with various solo and band projects and curates a concert series at Zurich's Kosmos.

© Tobias Stahel

Serge Lunin

Lecturer in three-dimensional design ZHdK, crafts teacher, adult educator, carpenter

Training as a construction and furniture maker, years of apprenticeship and travel in Europe and South America. Training as a crafts teacher and adult educator. Since 1990 lecturer at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) in the fields of three-dimensional design and experimental musical instrument making. Founder and owner of the company dukta gmbh. Lives and works in Zurich, married and father of three children.

Renato Grob

Set designer, objects and props, installations and special effects

Renato Grob designs and builds stages, objects and props, installations and special effects in the fields of scenography, advertising and art. Since 1992, he has been running a workshop for mechanics, where not only commissions are completed, but which also serves as a laboratory for constantly advancing skills autodidactically and for further training. The focus of his work is on creative processes, technical challenges, manual and digital production. Training as a stage pyrotechnician.

Micha Bietenhader

Artist and lighting designer, video technician, art educator

Micha Bietenhader was born in Zug in 1985. From 2006 to 2010 he completed a bachelor's degree in design and art in the Art and Communication programme at the HSLU Lucerne. Since graduating, he has worked as a freelance artist and lighting designer for theatre productions and as a lighting and video technician at the Südpol Theatre in Lucerne, the Neumarkt Theatre in Zurich and as head of the video department at the Zürcher Theaterspektakel. He has many years of experience as technical director of various events and festivals such as the International Comic Festival Fumetto in Lucerne. As an artist, he devotes himself to the field of media installations with exhibitions in Vienna, Berlin, Zurich, Kassel, Chur and Basel, among others.

Morena Barra

Documentary filmmaker and video artist

Morena Barra, born in Naples in 1991, grew up in Ebnat-Kappel and lives in St. Gallen. Since 2012 she has been travelling with her cameras in the documentary and artistic field. Her passion for video art and essay film began during her film studies at the F+F School of Art and Design, and she has devoted herself to them ever since. With the medium of video, Morena Barra deals with socio-cultural, feminist, erotic and existential themes.

Yasemin Özdemir

Sign language specialist and educator

Completed her apprenticeship as a businesswoman at the Centre for Hearing and Speech Zurich ZGSZ. This was followed by several training courses in sign language. In 2018, she completed her training as a sign language specialist FAGS at the Intercantonal School of Remedial Education HfH and the Swiss Federation of the Deaf SGB-FSS. She works as a pedagogical assistant / class assistant at the Centre for Hearing and Speech and as a flight attendant.

Andrin Siebenhaar

Automation technician and dedicated supporter for the deaf

Completed his training as an automation technician at the vocational school for learners with hearing and communication disabilities in Zurich-Örlikon. He was involved in organising and leading various activities at summer camps for the middle school in Untersiggenthal and was the contact person for problems / concerns at the Landenhof (centre and Swiss school for the hard of hearing).

Brigitta Luisa Merki

Artistic direction, staging

Brigitta Luisa Merki's dance and choreographic career began as the founder of the dance company Flamencos en route (1984) - a unique phenomenon in the Swiss dance landscape. With her international ensemble, she combined dance, music, song, literature and visual arts to create a synthesis of the arts. The dialogue between these different forms of artistic expression gives her choreographic signature an unmistakable profile with independent and atmospherically dense productions.

Dance journalist Angela Reinhardt describes Brigitta Luisa Merki as an explorative boundary crosser: "With great freedom, with a comprehensive knowledge of literature, music and painting, but above all with a heartfelt education that has become so rare in the arts today, she expands her art beyond supposed boundaries. What characterises Brigitta Luisa Merki's pieces most emphatically is the honesty of her art: she never sticks to a pleasing surface, but exposes the hidden dialogues that exist between words, images, music and her art, dance."

In 1999 Brigitta Luisa Merki received the Cultural Prize of the AZ Media Group Switzerland. In 2004 she was honoured with the Hans Reinhart Ring, the highest award in theatre and dance in Switzerland (since 2013 endowed by the BAK as the Swiss Grand Prix Dance).

© Alex Spichale