The year began with an impressive in-house production for the International Women's Day on March 8th. Under the direction of Imke Logar-Thiessen, the female research group FRAUENWERK came together in Bleiburg to research feminism. The result was the first in-house production "Blood & Milk" with two performances at the Kulturni Dom Pliberk/Bleiburg and a repeat performance at the Kammerlichtspiele in Klagenfurt.

In May and June, the residency "Hey, Hay" by dancers Anna Possarnig & Jerca Rožnik Novak took place in Bad Eisenkappel in cooperation with the FLOTA association from Slovenia at the Vinkl-homestead. With a focus on common geographical roots, cultural overlaps and the shared space beyond national borders, they explored childhood memories and collective consciousness in order to decode myths surrounding the "land". The final performance on June 3rd also featured a concert by Aki Traar.

On June 17th, Bleiburg was once again transformed into a stage for the Long Night of Dance, where audiences experienced contemporary dance performances on marked trails around the city. Three residencies took place within the Long Night of Dance, which were presented in the "TRIPTYCHON" performances. On June 15th, an open dance workshop with the Swiss company MEK was also held in Bleiburg, aimed at all ages and levels of experience. superhaus Filmproduktion is working on film portraits of the artists-in-residence as part of the Long Night of Dance 2023, which will be submitted to film festivals around the world from 2024 onwards. For the Long Night of Dance 2023, a project choir has also been set up under the direction of Anne Hein and Julian Gamisch, with the participation of the choirs Mepz Podjuna, Mladinski zbor Danica and Novum.

In June, the school project FAUSTLOS took place in Lavamünd, addressing issues of violence through dance, art, music, theatre, literature, comics and photography with students. Hundreds of students took part and on June 30th the final event "Powerful Day" took place.

After several years of preparation, the CCB held the first LABOR - an experimental field for aspiring choreographers and dancers - from 4th to 12th August at the Domenig Steinhaus on Lake Ossiach. The ten-day LABOR served as an incubator for the next generation of artists and offered support in developing a choreographic language and experimenting with different compositional tools. Guido Markowitz was the mentor.

The year also included the development of a choreographic theatre piece about Christine Lavant, which will be premiered in March 2024 in Bleiburg. The performance is one of the winning projects of the 2nd call for proposals of the "Carinthian Cultural Foundation" and will have its premiere in March 2024 at the Kulturni Dom Pliberg/Bleiburg. On May 4th 2023 at 6 pm, CCB was part of the program of the Ingeborg-Bachmann-Dome, which stood on Vienna's Karlsplatz square from April 21st to May 18th.

The CCB has undergone a major development in recent years, both in organisational and artistic terms. Since 2022, our new CCB management team (Jutta Mitteregger and Mirjam Sadjak) has been working closely with the individual project teams to further develop the organisational structure. Our priorities are to raise the team members' fees to an appropriate level, to optimise organisational processes and to further develop the CCB's vision and goals.