Johann Kresnik

Johann "Hans" Kresnik (12 December 1939 – 27 July 2019) was an Austrian dancer, and theater director working in the tradition of German Tanztheater (dance theater) who is known for his politically charged approach to dance.

Early life Johann Kresnik was born on 12 December 1939 in Sankt Margarethen, in the municipality of Bleiburg in the South Austrian state of Carinthia. It has been said that at the age of three he witnessed the shooting of his father—then serving in the Wehrmacht—by Slovenian partisans. He began his professional life working as a toolmaker, and his career as a performer began almost accidentally when he got a walk-on part at the Graz opera house in the late 1950s.

Artistic style Kresnik works within the tradition of Tanztheater and Expressionist dance pioneered by Kurt Jooss (whose piece The Green Table he greatly admired) and Mary Wigman. He had worked on even at a ripe old age, so he presented the revival of his piece Macbeth from 1988 with the ensemble TANZLIN.Z, which opened Vienna International Dance Festival ImPulsTanz 2019 on 11 July 2019. And he had been honoured the same day with the Golden Medal of Merit of the State of Vienna by the City Councillor for Art and Science. Kresnik had given his personal archive with 40 years of dance history as early as August 2008 to the Academy of Arts, Berlin.