Pina Bausch primarily worked in in Wuppertal, Germany as a chooregrapher. She lived suring a very difficult time in Germany, post World War two and post Halocaust. This was a very difficult time for Germnay, where the entire world was recovering from the horrors of what happened. Pina Bausch was very interested in expressing human emotions through her dances. Pina Bausch pioneered a style known as Tanztheater or “dance theater.” Tanztheater blends dance and everyday movement with theatre, speech, music and clever use of props and sets. Bausch’s choreography often highlighted social issues such as alienation, identity, and the search for connection. Pina Bausch's work captured so many intense German and international sentiments. Bausch so famously said “I’m not interested in how people move but what moves them.” Once again, Bausch was deeply concerned with expressing the human condition through dance.
Pina Bausch rarely spoke on her work but we get a quote from her that speaks for the potential she saw in dance:
“The fantastic possibility we have on stage is that we might be able to do things that one is not allowed to do or cannot do in normal life. Sometimes, we can only clarify something by confronting ourselves with what we don’t know. And sometimes the questions we have bring us back to experiences which are much older, which not only come from our culture and not only deal with the here and now. It is, as if a certain knowledge returns to us, which we indeed always had, but which is not conscious and present. It reminds us of something, which we all have in common. This gives us great strength.”