Charitable Association: Initiative Tänzerdorf e.V.
The association Initiative Tänzerdorf e.V. was founded on July 25, 2020 by 15 people and has officially been recognized as a charitable non-profit organization since May 20, 2021.
You can find our contact details below.
Now, after around six years, the association is maturing into a kind of “school-age child,” taking on increasing project responsibility and long-term commitment.
Since 2023, we have been leasing a larger piece of land in Portugal, Vale Bacias, where we are working to manifest a real dancers’ village over the coming years. Since June 2026, water and electricity have been available on site in this deeply rural pioneering project, and we now aim to maintain a continuous presence there and welcome guests regularly. Since August 2025, there has been a formal declaration of intent allowing us to develop the place over the next 30 years.
The association’s biggest step of growth has been the lease of the NFH Sommerecke in the Black Forest since summer 2024, which is now secured through 2031.
At Sommerecke, we organize jams, residencies, and various forms of gathering time, while also hosting other groups. Organizationally and financially, this is our largest project, involving several part-time employees and a great deal of volunteer work. Here, we are developing a dancers’ hostel and our Tänzerdorf gathering place, and within just the first months, more has happened and more of Tänzerdorf has emerged here than in all the years before.
In 2026, a clear expansion and rejuvenation of the Sommerecke team is taking place, after a core team of six people carried the project through its first 18 months until the end of 2025 and established our presence and work at Sommerecke.
We warmly invite you to join our jams, and you can register online. Our previous jams have truly been a great success, and we are grateful to have reached and touched so many people through them.
We also organize longer events: the Vale Bacias Nature Journeys, where we immerse ourselves in nature and dance with it for 8–14 days, and the two-week CI residencies at Sommerecke. Most of our events include elements of international exchange as well as nature conservation.
At the moment, we are also hoping for your support as the association enters its next phase — continuing to grow, reaching more people again, and bringing further ideas into reality.
We are happy to welcome new supporters, both for the association itself and for our concrete projects. You can apply for membership online.
Become a supporter!
Contacts
Association Office:
Information Channels
Association Address
Initiative Tänzerdorf e.V.
Am Rohrgraben 4
79249 Merzhausen
Germany
Legal Information
Registered at Freiburg District Court (Amtsgericht Freiburg i.Br.)
Registration Number: VR 703066
Registered Office: Freiburg im Breisgau
Chairperson: Marc André Stephan
Deputy Chairpersons: Gustav Kolbe, Jonas Gebauer, Jürgen Herzer