For the 2024/25 season, the seven theatres that make up the Alliance of International Production Houses are organising an event series focusing on the field of practice we call Arts & Encounters. The series of events will see each of our Alliance members present strategies on how to foster even greater participation and involvement on the part of groups and individuals representing our multifaceted society. Together with these “accomplices” – the people without whom our theatres would not be what they are today – we are eager to examine a number of pressing issues, including our shared lives in neighbourhoods of diversity, potential strategies of resistance in the realm of social networks, and the growing tension between generations. Last but not least, we also want to continue to explore ways of opening up our theatres even further to the public and boosting the status of these venues as valuable spaces of encounter.

The training programme ›Mehr Diversität in Kultur‹ by the inclusive Cologne-based cultural and consulting company Un-Label is now starting for PACT in September. As a public institution where people with different experiences of discrimination and realities of life come together, PACT has long seen itself as having a responsibility when it comes to reducing barriers – in the stage area as well as with residencies and audiences, in the urban space and in its own team.

The qualification programme is part of the major Access Maker - Innovation Hub funding project, which will train and support three to four cultural organisations per year until June 2027. In addition to PACT, Lichthof Theatre Hamburg and Landesbühnen Sachsen are taking part in the first round, which starts in September. The programme includes ongoing mentoring and training courses focusing on topics such as aesthetics of access, awareness, barrier-free PR and communication and collaboration with artists with disabilities.