Mårten Spångberg

Mårten Spångberg is a past critic. Throughout the nineties he has been writing as a dance critic for the Swedish newspapers Aftonbladet (1991-93) and Dagens Nyheter (1993-97). From 1993 to 2001 he was Nordic correspondent for Ballet International. Besides he published in several specialised art and performance magazines such as ArtGenda Magazine, Art Press, A-Prior, Danstidningen, Endurance Magazine, Fraksija, Material, Merge, MusikDramatik, and Visslingar och Rop. Sarma will present a selection of the reviews written for Aftonbladet, Dagens Nyheter and Ballet International. This anthology is supplemented by essays written for other media.

Mårten Spångberg (°1968), lives and works in Berlin as essayist, performance critic, dramaturg and choreographer. After studies in Music, Dance and Theatre Science at the Universities of Uppsala and Stockholm, he started writing as a opera and dance critic for daily newspapers, such as Aftonbladet (1991-93) and Dagens Nyheter (1993-97). Besides he published in several magazines such as ArtGenda Magazine, Art Press, A-Prior, Danstidningen, Endurance Magazine, Fraksija, Material, Merge, MusikDramatik, and Visslingar och Rop, was Nordic correspondent for Ballet International (1993-2001), contributed to books, and wrote catalogue texts for among others Bayerische Staatsballet, Holland Festival, Schauspielhaus Hamburg, Cullberg Ballet, Jerôme Bel, Thomas Lehmen and Tino Sehgal.

He is guest professor at the University of Giessen, Dept. of Applied Theatre Studies, and associate teacher of dramaturgy at dance school P.A.R.T.S, Brussels. As curator, he initiated the Panacea Festivals in Stockholm (1996-2001) and co-curated the Body Currency, Wiener Festwochen (1998), Read My Lips, Oslo (1997), the fourth International Summer Academy, Frankfurt (2002), and CAPITALS Acarte, Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon, (2002-2003).

His collaborations as performer include the collective Fame Internationale, BDC and Tom Plischke, Xavier Le Roy, Bak-truppen, and Alice Chauchat. He did dramaturgical work for Ina C. Johannessen, I. Bjornsgaard, Angela Guerreiro, Dennis O’Connor, Lilia Mestre/Mette Edvardsen, and Christine de Smedt/Les Ballets C de la B. His own performance projects are internationally presented: Avantgarde (1999), Recent Works (2000), Plosion (2001), i.e. All All Over Over All All et.al. (2002), Artists’ talk (2002). In 2001 he choreographed on commission Break, Intermission, Before and After for Ballett Frankfurt.