In her mid-40s, Susanne Kirnbauer-Bundy had to end her career as an active ballet dancer: There is no place on the ballet stage for an aging body – let alone an aging female body. Now, at over 80, Kirnbauer-Bundy joins up with choreographer Doris Uhlich for the third time to explore ways for her energy to transform beyond the ballet steps she is no longer able to perform. Come Back Again is a performance about the courage to challenge one’s own body biography and choose new paths at an advanced age. In a limbo of change and rearrangement, two dancers of different generations meet to revisit the past, illuminate the present and conduct futuristic archaeology.

Doris Uhlich (*1977) is an Austrian choreographer and performer who devises projects with various formats, from stage pieces to site-specific performances. She works with people with different backgrounds and bodies, opens the dancefloor to people with physical disabilities, demonstrates the potential of nudity beyond sexualisation and provocation and examines the relationship between humans and machines in manifold ways. Uhlich has received numerous awards and accolades, most recently the 2024 Austrian Art Prize issued by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Art, Culture, Civil Service and Sport in the category of ‘performing arts’. Her piece SONNE was also awarded the 2024 Austrian Musical Theatre Award in the category ‘Best dance production’. www.dorisuhlich.at

Susanne Kirnbauer-Bundy (*1942) is an Austrian dancer and choreographer who started her career at the age of eight at the Vienna State Opera’s ballet school. In 1956, she was accepted to the Vienna State Opera Ballet, where she advanced to solo dancer in 1967 and to principal solo dancer in 1972. She danced main parts in both the classical and the modern repertoire. Following the end of her career as an active dancer, she ran the Volksoper Wien’s ballet department from 1986 to 1996, where she choreographed full-length ballet productions and also supervised choreographies in several operettas. She then worked in Italy, Germany, Switzerland, for the Salzburg Festival and the Seefestspiele Mörbisch. In 2022, she received the Province of Vienna’s Gold Badge of Merit. Her artistic collaboration with Doris Uhlich goes back to their productions SPITZE (2008) and Come Back (2012). www.susanne-kirnbauer.at