Viktor Szeri
Creative Crossroads Cycle Two 2025–2026
Viktor Szeri (born 1993) is an independent performer and choreographer based in Budapest. In his multidisciplinary pieces, the interplay of different (performing) art forms and visual solutions can be observed. His spontaneous and improvisational creative processes are usually motivated by a desire to express a mood or a feeling. Yet, dance always plays a crucial role in his work: for him, it is a language through which the imperfect, transient and vulnerable human body can break free of the constraints of social norms. His performances are visceral: blurring the boundaries between the stage and the auditorium, they invite us into intimate realities where the audience has an active role. The ideology and complexity of conventional art spaces, such as theatres and galleries, are as much a source of interest as the potential in public spaces, off-sites, and abandoned buildings.
He always looks for new solutions, often in collaborations. In 2018, he founded the artist group Hollow with Tamás Páll and Gyula Muskovics, with whom he has worked regularly ever since. In their immersive installations and performances choreography and dance are combined with poetry, new media art, and role-playing to create "world prototypes" where the dominant systems of consensual reality can be questioned or modified.
He received a BA in Choreography at the Budapest Contemporary Dance School, and an MA in Media Design at the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design in Budapest. Recently, he has been awarded several scholarships and residencies in Budapest, Prague, Berlin, Vienna, Paris, Istanbul, Warsaw, Tbilisi, and Minsk. His individual works and collaborations have been presented in Budapest at Trafó House of Contemporary Arts, MU Theatre, DunaPart - Platform for Contemporary Performing Arts, art quarter budapest, Studio of Young Artists' Association, Placcc Dance, as well as MeetFactory (Prague), Y Events, Divadlo X10 (Prague), House of Arts (Brno), Donaufestival (Krems), Art Cologne (Cologne), Montag Modus (Berlin), radialsystem (Berlin), and Open Space - Centre for Visual and Performing Arts (Tbilisi).
His piece Fatigue was awarded the Rudolf Lábán Prize for the best contemporary dance performance in 2022.
Since 2020, he has been the main organizer of the Under500 interdisciplinary performing arts festival in Budapest Festival.
Find more about Viktor Szeri on his website.
I Quit Ordinary Dancing
at Nextfeszt in Budapest
Spontaneous street scenes, bodies moving intuitively to music, and the sometimes destructive forms of joy inspire Viktor Szeri’s piece: I Quit Ordinary Dancing.
While maximizing pleasure and hedonism associated with dance, Szeri draws from reality. The source of pleasure, however, is not in the beauty of the movements or the linearity of the story. By abandoning their comfort, both the artist and the audience work toward catharsis.
Through the themes of having fun and entertainment, and by questioning their own role, Szeri explores what art can offer beyond cultural consumption. With disturbing, slowly undulating scenes, Szeri also highlights that while dance is an elemental part of life, the act of creation can be isolating for artists, separating them from others. Instead of entertaining, the aim is to foster immersion, from which dance unfolds as a sensual experience.
I Quit Ordinary Dancing
by Viktor Szeri
7 March 2025, 20:00
Nextfeszt Trafo Budapest
Find details & tickets here.
