ROMY SCHMIDT
Romy Schmidt was born in the former East Germany, in Löbau/East Saxony. As a theatre director and art curator, she works interdisciplinary on new forms of storytelling in which she critically examines old narratives. In doing so, she focuses on various constellations and projects at WHY NOT? KOLLEKTIV around questions of visibility, representation, and forms of multiperspective narration as well as on the uncovering of untold stories.
She studied communication and media management at Stuttgart Media University and received a grant to attend Interspherial Pictures Stuttgart’s screenwriting school. Since 2007, she has directed numerous plays and performance pieces at state and municipal theatres, as well as for the independent arts scene nationwide. In 2017, one of her productions received 1st Place at the contest nachtkritik-Theatertreffen.
Between 2015 and 2018, she was the artistic and managing director of the Prinz-Regent-Theater in Bochum, where she produced several new pieces while also devoting herself to new forms of local audience development and ways of anchoring the institution in the urban space and its citizens. In the season of 2015, she founded the International Ensemble Grubengold as well as two other youth ensembles for emerging artists, aspiring actors, directors, and costume and set designers. She also engaged in the launching of the Kreativ.Quartier Prinz.Regent and an artist’s residency program called Floating Rooms, to promote professional perspectives for local artists. In 2018, she hosted the Junge Ensemble Netzwerk with the Conference of Theatre Students in Bochum. With the projects and cooperation programs carried out under her direction, she contributed to developing a place for artistic and social encounters bringing together audiences and ensembles increasingly diverse in age, social, and political backgrounds.
In 2018, she created the transnational WHY NOT? KOLLEKTIV, which annually develops a major production of plays and artworks for the independent performing arts scene in Germany, as well as research on cultures of remembrance in East European (post)socialist narratives, and the design of new programs for cultural mediation.
Romy Schmidt continuously collaborates with artists, journalists, and scholars from the former GDR and the post-transition generation, around questions of contemporary positioning on East German narratives in art, culture, and politics. Since 2018, she has taken part in different projects approaching this tension from an East German and (Eastern) European perspective for a pluralistic culture of remembrance.
From November 2020 to March 2021 she was a Fellow Artist at the Artists in Residence Ruhr Program KREATIVCAMPUS.RUHR of ecce — european centre for creative economy, participating with the international co-production WHY NOT? SUPER SONIC STORYTELLING which also won an award. In mid-2021, she joined the Görlitz-Zgorgelec Socio-Cultural Center RABRYKA IN WERK I as interim executive director, focusing on program development and third-party fundraising.
She is currently working on an exhibition on the subject of reeducation concerning special children's residential homes of the GDR for cultural mediation and culture of remembrance in Berlin, as well as on a new dance production on non-European dance and media art in NRW. Romy Schmidt lives, works, and commutes between NRW, East Saxony, and Berlin.
ROMY SCHMIDT
Romy Schmidt was born in the former East Germany, in Löbau/East Saxony. As a theatre director and art curator, she works interdisciplinary on new forms of storytelling in which she critically examines old narratives. In doing so, she focuses on various constellations and projects at WHY NOT? KOLLEKTIV around questions of visibility, representation, and forms of multiperspective narration as well as on the uncovering of untold stories.
She studied communication and media management at Stuttgart Media University and received a grant to attend Interspherial Pictures Stuttgart’s screenwriting school. Since 2007, she has directed numerous plays and performance pieces at state and municipal theatres, as well as for the independent arts scene nationwide. In 2017, one of her productions received 1st Place at the contest nachtkritik-Theatertreffen.
Between 2015 and 2018, she was the artistic and managing director of the Prinz-Regent-Theater in Bochum, where she produced several new pieces while also devoting herself to new forms of local audience development and ways of anchoring the institution in the urban space and its citizens. In the season of 2015, she founded the International Ensemble Grubengold as well as two other youth ensembles for emerging artists, aspiring actors, directors, and costume and set designers. She also engaged in the launching of the Kreativ.Quartier Prinz.Regent and an artist’s residency program called Floating Rooms, to promote professional perspectives for local artists. In 2018, she hosted the Junge Ensemble Netzwerk with the Conference of Theatre Students in Bochum. With the projects and cooperation programs carried out under her direction, she contributed to developing a place for artistic and social encounters bringing together audiences and ensembles increasingly diverse in age, social, and political backgrounds.
In 2018, she created the transnational WHY NOT? KOLLEKTIV, which annually develops a major production of plays and artworks for the independent performing arts scene in Germany, as well as research on cultures of remembrance in East European (post)socialist narratives, and the design of new programs for cultural mediation.
Romy Schmidt continuously collaborates with artists, journalists, and scholars from the former GDR and the post-transition generation, around questions of contemporary positioning on East German narratives in art, culture, and politics. Since 2018, she has taken part in different projects approaching this tension from an East German and (Eastern) European perspective for a pluralistic culture of remembrance.
From November 2020 to March 2021 she was a Fellow Artist at the Artists in Residence Ruhr Program KREATIVCAMPUS.RUHR of ecce — european centre for creative economy, participating with the international co-production WHY NOT? SUPER SONIC STORYTELLING which also won an award. In mid-2021, she joined the Görlitz-Zgorgelec Socio-Cultural Center RABRYKA IN WERK I as interim executive director, focusing on program development and third-party fundraising.
She is currently working on an exhibition on the subject of reeducation concerning special children's residential homes of the GDR for cultural mediation and culture of remembrance in Berlin, as well as on a new dance production on non-European dance and media art in NRW. Romy Schmidt lives, works, and commutes between NRW, East Saxony, and Berlin.
