Julie Paucker and Dagmar Hirsekorn

Photo: Julie Paucker

Born in Basel in 1976, grew up in Thalwil (ZH). While studying German and French literature, Julie Paucker worked as a project manager at Migros Culture Percentage. She began her theatre career with Marthaler at the Schauspielhaus Zurich. From 2006, she was a dramaturge and member of the management team at Theater Basel, 2013-18 at Deutsches Nationaltheater Weimar. Since 2018, she has worked as a freelance dramaturge and author at the Volkstheater Vienna, Theaterdiscounter Berlin and Theater St. Gallen, amongst others, and develops independent projects with the KULA Compagnie. KULA sees itself as a platform for transnational theatre, working with artists from different countries. Julie Paucker has been a guest lecturer at art colleges such as the August Everding Munich, the University of North Texas, the Goethe Institute in Atlanta USA, the Esad drama school in Paris and, regularly, the University of Performing Arts Baden-Württemberg. She has been the Artistic Director of the Swiss Theatre Meeting since 2021.

Photo: Tanja Dorendorf T+T Fotografie

Dagmar Hirsekorn, born in Zurich in 1981, first studied acting for two years at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Zürich and then again at the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts. Since graduating, she has worked as a freelance theatre maker and speaker – and righly so, because she soon realised that she was speaking and writing non-stop anyway. That’s why she also started writing journalistically about culture and the small and medium-sized dramas of everyday life, narrating literature and, in 2020, producing her first theatre play, ‘Not Interesting’ with hirsekorn.rüegg. Three years ago, she started attending court hearings regularly. Since then, her fascination with the law, criminal law, legal issues and the different perspectives of all participants in the process has never waned. She now talks and writes about this topic constantly.