The Jury for the 2024 Theatertreffen

Eva Behrendt was born in Waiblingen in 1973 and studied history, German philology and theatre studies in Mainz, Dijon and Berlin. She has been a member of Theater heute’s editorial staff since 2001 and writes as a freelance critic for taz, Die Zeit, Merkur and others. She also teaches as a guest lecturer at the Institute of Theatre Studies at Freie Universität Berlin. She was and is a member of several juries (Berliner Senatsverwaltung für Kultur und Europa, Theatertreffen, Theaterpreis Berlin, Hauptstadtkulturfonds, Politik im freien Theater, Impulse etc.) and has most recently been a member of the selection committee of Mülheimer Theatertage.

Janis El-Bira was born in Braunschweig in 1986, studied philosophy and history in Berlin and has been working as a critic, author and moderator with a focus on theatre. Since 2016, he has been a freelance editor and moderator of the radio programme “Rang 1 – Das Theatermagazin” on Deutschlandfunk Kultur and in 2019, he joined the editorial team of nachtkritik.de. He has also written texts and articles for Berliner Zeitung, Deutschlandfunk Kultur and SWR2. From 2016 to 2019, he was project leader of Theatertreffen-Blog, a project for the promotion of emerging journalists. He has been a jury member for Mülheim Dramatists’ Award, Fonds Darstellende Künste and the festival Politik im Freien Theater.

Theresa Luise Gindlstrasser was born in 1989 and lives in Vienna. As a freelance critic, she writes for DER STANDARD, FALTER, Theater der Zeit and other media. She studied philosophy and art studies in Linz and scenic writing in Graz, and works on theatre texts under the name of Anah Filou. She attended the class for performative art at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and took part in the academy for contemporary theatre journalism of the Alliance of International Production Houses in Germany. She was a jury member for several institutions including the Young Choreographers’ Award at ImPulsTanz in Vienna. From 2017 to 2022, she was a member of the board of advisors for performing arts in Austria.

Valeria Heintges was born in Düsseldorf in 1968 and has been living in Zurich since 2010. She studied German philology as well as history and philosophy in Münster/Westfalen and Freiburg/Breisgau and worked as an arts editor with a focus on theatre in Dresden and St. Gallen. From 2016 to 2018, she was a jury member at Solothurner Literaturtage. She has been working freelance since 2017 and writes for media including nachtkritik.de, Theater heute, NZZ am Sonntag and publications of the CH Media Group.

Martin Thomas Pesl was born in 1983 in Vienna, where he still lives and works as an author, translator, speaker and editor. He reports on subjects including theatre for FALTER, nachtkritik.de and Deutschlandfunk Kultur. Furthermore, he joined the NESTROY-jury in 2021 and curated the theatre programme for Kultursommer Wien in 2022 and 2023.

Katrin Ullmann was born in Heidelberg in 1971. She studied German Philology and Art History in Hamburg. Since 1998, she has worked as a freelance journalist and critic for media such as Theater heute, Tagesspiegel, taz, tanz, Deutschlandfunk Kultur and Die Zeit. She has been a member of the jury for Hamburg’s Kulturbehörde (cultural authority) from 2011 to 2015 and once again since 2021 as well as a jury member of NPN (Nationales Performance Netz) since 2018.

Born in Dortmund in 1971. He studied Theatre, Film and Television Studies at Ruhr-Universität Bochum. He has been working as a freelance cultural journalist and critic since 1994, for media including nachtkritik.de, Theater der Zeit and the magazine kultur.west. He has been a member of the latter’s editorial team since 2018. In 2014 and 2019, he was a member of the jury of critics for the NRW-Theatertreffen.