Ponderosa

An hour from Berlin, where the fields open onto the idyllic Lower Oder Valley National Park, Ponderosa has spent twenty years turning itself into a home for dance and somatics.

Set in the village of Stolzenhagen, Ponderosa has grown out of a deep history with dance, contact improvisation, yoga, and artistic exchange across the region and beyond. It is a place where the study and the practice of dance, performance, somatics, and contemporary art meet. People come here to step outside their usual frame, share what they're working on, and add to a kind of living exchange between the independent scene and the wider art and performance world.

Known for the P.O.R.C.H. summer school, the Ponderosa Tanzland Festival with its events, workshops, concerts, and performances, an Artists-in-Residence program, and its own kitchen and gardens. All of it is held across four studios, a garden, a kitchen, a library, and the spaces between, built to give people room to grow both mentally and physically and to try things they haven't tried before.

Ponderosa is constantly welcoming international gathering and it is also a home for its long-term residents and local audience. Legally it runs as a members association, open to anyone who wants to join. It also rents out studios and performance space, and offers work exchanges, and funding guidance. Community events are designed to be accessible.

There's a contact improvisation jam most Wednesday evenings, saunas, compost toilets, solar showers, an office that works as a co-working space, and a cat.