Judith Blankenberg works as a programmer for Grand Theatre and Noorderzon Performing Arts Festival in Groningen. Her programming career started in Rotterdam at Festival De Keuze, which is part of the city theatre Rotterdamse Schouwburg. Before running the festival herself, she assisted Annemie Vanackere (Hebbel Am Ufer, Berlin), and collaborated subsequently with Mark Yeoman (Noorderzon, Groningen) – the former artistic directors of Festival De Keuze. She received training in dramaturgy at Utrecht University. During her advanced masters Theatre Studies at the University of Antwerp she worked as an intern for Noorderzon and wrote a thesis about programming international festivals in the Netherlands. She lives and works in Groningen.

Noorderzon is an annually recurring eleven-day performing arts festival. With a distinctive high-quality artistic profile, with a cutting-edge (inter)national and local programme, in combination with an uncommonly low threshold, Noorderzon appeals to an extremely wide and diverse public: from professional to novice.

Grand Theatre is an iconic theatre for independent performing arts, situated on the central ‘Grote Markt’ in Groningen. It’s a place where (inter)national artists show their work to an audience, create new work in a curated environment and the influence of the surrounding city is as big as the artists want it to be. A hosting and presenting theatre in the middle of the real world.

Dates attending Dance Massive: 12 - 17 March

Judith Blankenberg’s visit is supported by Dutch Performing Arts.