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Jürg Koch, freelance dance artist, Berne Switzerland, received his MA from the London Contemporary Dance School. He has been working internationally as a performer, choreographer and dance educator for the past fifteen years. Working with Candoco, integrating disabled and non-disabled performers, and dancing in contemporary repertory including works by Bill T Jones, Javier de Frutos and Fin Walker informs Koch’s artistic and pedagogic outlook. In January 2004 he joined the faculty of the University of Washington as a lecturer. He was appointed Assistant Professor in 2008 and promoted to Associated Professor in 2014. During his time in Seattle, Koch regularly appeared as a guest performer for the Chamber Dance Company and in contemporary works by Mark Haim amongst others. His choreographic work spans from productions with students in higher education to commissions for various dance companies including Candoco (UK) and Flatfoot Dance Company (South Africa). Koch’s work has been performed in USA, Europe and South Africa, including the NWNW Festival at On the Boards, The Bridge Project at Velocity and the Seattle International Dance Festival. As an educator Koch focuses on contemporary dance technique and composition. He has a specialized interest in Integrated Dance and creating access to course content for a diversity of students. He is the organizer of the annual Integrated Dance Summer Intensive in Seattle.

Henrique Amoedo is a graduate student in Human Motricity in Dance in FMH –Faculdade de Motricidade Humana / University of Lisbon inPortugal. He has a master in Artistic Performance –Dance in the same university and post-graduate in Body Awareness in UFRN –Universida de Federal do Rio Grande do Norte (in Brazil), and is also graduate in Physical Education and Sports by FIG –Faculdades Integradas de Guarulhos –Guarulhos. He is an author, teacher and guest speaker in national and international events concerned with the subject of Inclusive Dance and the inclusion of people with disability in the artistic universe. He is also an advisor for public and private institutions for the implementation of artistic activities designed for people with disability, as well as a teacher and choreographer.He has developed artistic works and has been on the artistic direction of different projects in partnerships with other European institutions, among them Máquina Letal, with Fundación Psico Ballet Maite León (Madrid) and ENDLESS, that premiered in May 2012, a life-long learning Grundtvig project with partners from Germany,Lithuania, Poland and Estonia.Currentlyhe is the Artistic Director of Associação dos Amigos da Arte Inclusiva –Dançando com a Diferença and Grupo Dançando com a Diferença (group Dancing with the Difference), in Portugal.

Maria Koliopoulou was born in Athens, where she lives and works. She attended the Laban Centre for Movement and Dance on a scholarship, earning a Diploma in Dance Theater and a Bachelor of Arts with Honors. She studied at the Vacalo School of Arts & Design in parallel.She is a founder member of the Prosxima contemporary dance company. Choreographies of hers have been performed at the Onassis Stegi, the Athens Festival, the Athens School of Fine Art, the 1stMediterranean Contemporary Dance Platform in Chania, Crete, the Athens Megaron Concert Hall (1st, 2ndand 4thContemporary Dance Platforms), the Szóló Duó International Dance Festival (Budapest), the Tanz_house Salzburg Choreographer Platform, Tanzkosmos (Vienna), the Duncan Centre (Prague), the Abundance festival (Karlstad), the Stockholm Fringe Fest, the Balkan Dance Platform (Ljubljana), and the Anoichto, Embros, Knossos, Neos Kosmos, Poreia, Fournos and Chora theaters in Greece. As a choreographer, she has collaborated with the Danish Institute on building bridges between female artists and with Patras European Capital of Cultural 2006, the Neos Kosmos theater, the Greek National Theatre and the Regional State Theatre of Serres. In 2013, her choreography "praxis 21 –mneme" took the 2nd Prize at the Algiers International Dance festival, where she represented Greece. In 2008, she won the Jarmila Jeřábková award for two solo works, "praxis 1.3" and "praxis 3", at the New Europe Festival in Prague, while her "Waltzing Apart" earned her an award in Budapest in 2005. Her performance in the video dance "Three Times" also garnered an award at the Il Choreografo Eletroniko festival in Naples in the same year. She contributed an essay entitled “Developing artistic skills in the teaching of dance” to "Culture and Art: seven essays on dance". She has also taught for over ten years in both primary and secondary education (Doukas School; German School, Athens) and in a number of private dance schools in Athens. She has led seminars at the Greek National Dance School, the Kalamata International Dance Festival, the Athens School of Fine Art, the Onassis Stegi and the Michael Cacoyannis Foundation. She is currently teaching movement workshops at the Onassis Stegi to mixed groups of dancers and people with mobility disabilities in the context of the Unlimited Access program.

Jiorgos Christakis is the founder of the DA.GI.PO.LI dance theatre company and consistently at the forefront of initiatives which seek to embrace ‘difference’.As a dancer and choreographer in a wheelchair, he has considerable professional and artistic experience. As asocial psychologist, he is currently a doctoral candidate at Panteion University. He has collaborated with contemporary dance companies including “Fygein Adynaton” [No Escape], “Lathos Kinisi” [Wrong Move] and“Aggeloskoni” [Angel Dust]. Having founded his own DA.GI.PO.LI dance company in May 2004, he has produced, choreographed, danced in, designed and organized all their performances to date. His work with DA.GI.PO.LI has left its mark, and the company has performed around the world, in America, Europe and Asia. As a teacher, his techniques and methods center on encounters between bodies with different functionalities and forms.

Stergiani Tsintziloni is a dance theorist and historian. She graduated with honors from the Greek National School of Dance and the University of Crete (Pedagogy Department), holds an MA in Dance Cultures from the University of Surrey, where she studied on an Alexander S.Onassis Public Benefit Foundation scholarship, and was awarded her Ph.D. by the University of Roehampton (UK). She has taught both theoretical and practical elements of Dance at the University of Patras (Theatre Studies Department), professional dance schools (including the Greek National Opera Dance School), and in the context of educational programs. She has been involved in conducting research for and programming the Kalamata International Dance Festival as an Associate Expert, and has also worked with the Isadora & Raymond Duncan Dance Research Centre (Athens), the Koula Pratsika Foundation, the “Melina” Program and the Museum of Cycladic Art.She has sat on the Dance Scholarship Committee of the Greek National Centre for Theatre and Dance, and is a member of the Onassis Foundation Dance Scholarships Committee. Papers of hers have been published in journals in Greece and internationally, and she is on the Editorial Committee of the Manifesto Lexicon, the Web dictionary maintained by Performance Studies International. Her research interests include the bridging of theory and practice; the history of dance in Greece; the critical history of dance in the 20thcentury; links between history, politics and dance; body memory; and theories of the body.