Dance performance by Raphael Moussa Hillebrand
The story isn’t over; the story goes on. My daughter. Happiness and madness go on. My mother is white, yours a Black woman. I grew up in the western half, you in a cosmopolitan city. Do you think the story is over? Berlin is so big, so free, so provincially violent.
Image gallery
Auf meinen Schultern
Auf meinen Schultern
Auf meinen Schultern
Auf meinen Schultern
Half the city was the cosmos of my childhood; with a roast chicken trip to the other galaxy. Are privileges short-lived? Do they open horizons or blind us? Who owns the whole city? Who is it made for? For you, for us? Black Berliner. I would like you to be spared a few experiences. But how?
Auf meinen Schultern (On my shoulders) is a solo performance by the dancer and choreographer Raphael Moussa Hillebrand, his first at Ballhaus Naunynstraße. Based on his experience of growing up in Berlin in the 1980s and 90s, he attempts to give shape to his own lived experience so that the next generation and his own child can connect to it – a danced, break-danced, spoken and performed passing on musically accompanied by the cellist Eurico Ferreira Mathias.
(in German with English surtitles)
Additional information
Raphael Moussa Hillebrand has been honored for his outstanding achievements in contemporary dance as part of the German Dance Award 2020. A year earlier, Raphael Moussa Hillebrand’s solo Auf meinen Schultern (On My Shoulders ) was released in collaboration with Ballhaus Naunynstraße. The German Dance Award jury’s citation states:
„We honour Raphael Hillebrand because, for all his charm and openness, he is an artist through and through, who recognizes in the body a motor that can only overcome the social imbalance in our society through courage.“
A production by Kultursprünge im Ballhaus Naunynstraße gemeinnützige GmbH. The Initial production was funded by the Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion of the State of Berlin and the Fonds Darstellende Künste with funds from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media.
„We honour Raphael Hillebrand because, for all his charm and openness, he is an artist through and through, who recognizes in the body a motor that can only overcome the social imbalance in our society through courage.“
A production by Kultursprünge im Ballhaus Naunynstraße gemeinnützige GmbH. The Initial production was funded by the Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion of the State of Berlin and the Fonds Darstellende Künste with funds from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media.
Participating artists
Laura Alonso (Choreografiemitarbeit)
Jaika Bahr (Dramaturgie)
Leonard Beck (Produktionsleitung)
Emilio Cordero Checa (Lichtdesign und Videoassistenz)
Eurico Ferreira Mathias (Musik)
Raphael Moussa Hillebrand (Choreografie, Performance & Videokonzept)
Monique Van den Bulck (Kostüm)
Raphael Moussa Hillebrand
Eurico Ferreira Mathias
Dates
November 2025
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