Graduation Performance 2026

Following their residency in Lausanne, the contemporary dance bachelor students at La Manufacture present a brand-new performance, supported by two acclaimed guest choreographers. Congolese artist Jolie Ngemi takes the lead. In her work, she develops a dialogue between contemporary aesthetics and her Congolese roots, building bridges between cultures and worlds of imagination. The students also worked with the Swiss dancer and choreographer Jeremy Nedd, whose work addresses racial and collective issues, and questions the means of building community in a hostile social and political climate. With this performance, the students definitively enter the professional dance world. 

• Jeremy Nedd is a Brooklyn-born choreographer and performer living in Switzerland. Nedd has worked for the Semperoper opera house in Dresden and for Ballett Basel. He is a guest artist connected with Schauspielhaus Zurich, where he collaborated with Trajal Harrell. He has also presented productions at Kaserne Basel, ROXY Birsfelden, Arsenic - center d'art scénique contemporain, Palais de Tokyo, and the Münchner Kammerspiele. He has previously appeared at KunstenfestivaldesArts, where Kaaitheater co-presented the production blue nile to the galaxy around olodumare in 2024.

• Jolie Ngemi is a contemporary and urban dance performer, choreographer and musician. She studied at P.A.R.T.S. and has collaborated with Ula Sickle and Boris Charmatz, among others. In 2018, she created her first solo piece, Identity na ngayi. At the beginning of 2020, she was hired as a teacher at the Amsterdam Academy. That same year, she participated in Serge Aymé Coulibaly's new creation, Wakat. She then founded her company AUC Production and the performing arts festival BOSANGANI, the second edition of which took place in August 2022 in Kinshasa and brought together European and African dancers for master classes, performances and round tables.