WINN Dance, a new Stuttgart-based company for dancers aged 40 and over, premieres its first two-part program at the Venice Dance Biennale on July 31 and August 1 before embarking on an international tour. The acronym stands for "when, if not now."

The ensemble includes former Mariinsky principal Diana Vishneva, Staatsballett Berlin guest principal Polina Semionova, Dutch National Ballet star Igone de Jongh, and 69-year-old American dancer Nora Kimball, whose career has spanned American Ballet Theatre, Nederlands Dans Theater and William Forsythe's Ballet Frankfurt.

"Age is a big deal in dance," Kimball told Pointe from her home in Frankfurt. "Musicians and fine artists can play and paint until they die, and actors can age onstage. But the body is the instrument of dance. There is no other violin to polish, no other paintbrush or color except that. The maintenance of the body is essential to the capacity of performance."

Kimball has never officially retired and continues to dance across a range of projects. Her latest engagement is with WINN.

The company's co-founders and directors are Marijn Rademaker, a former Stuttgart Ballet and Dutch National Ballet principal, and Slava Tutukin, a dancer-turned-cultural-strategist. When they approached select artists about joining, "Each and every one of them said yes immediately," says Rademaker. "We're also getting emails from a lot of older dancers that would like to join."

The model has a precedent. Rademaker drew inspiration from his memories of watching NDT III, Nederlands Dans Theater's company for dancers over 40, which closed in 2006 after 15 years. His own turbulent experiences with injury, burnout and retirement also shaped the project. The pair initially discussed a one-off production featuring mature dancers, but decided a longer-term project would carry their message "further into the dance world," says Tutukin, and "to show that dance isn't only about youth. It's about finding beauty at every stage of physical ability."

Kimball acknowledges that maintaining a dancer's body becomes harder with age. "Coordination, muscle activity, concentration…when you're a younger dancer, you have all that power in your body," she says. "The older you get, you delegate what you really need at the moment."

She argues that age also heightens other abilities. "We have a lot of roles behind us," she says of her fellow WINN dancers. "In that way, we can offer more; the palette is bigger." She describes the group's ability to work together "harmoniously," free from ego-driven concerns. "We don't have to prove anything," says Rademaker, "and that's such fertile ground to create on."

The choreographers working on WINN's debut include siblings Imre and Marne van Opstal, Omar Román de Jesús and Rainer Behr, all contributing sections to the company's first work, Death in Venice, based on Thomas Mann's 1912 novel. John Neumeier, the legendary former Hamburg Ballet director, himself 87, has created a second work titled Bridge of Sighs. German fashion brand BOSS has designed costumes for both pieces.

Age diversity among the choreographers mattered to Tutukin and Rademaker, who wanted to see how established and emerging voices would engage with the ensemble. Each brought a different approach: the van Opstals drew on their careers with NDT and Batsheva, while Behr brought a Tanztheater sensibility from his work with Pina Bausch. This stylistic range has enabled the ensemble to keep exploring new dance languages later into their careers.

"It's about this longing, this process of constantly searching," says Tutukin. "It's about finding yourself within your new body, experiences, knowledge, and abilities." For many older dancers, that process of discovery, not just performance, makes WINN compelling. "It's not like I have to be onstage," says Kimball, "but the choreographic process of being a muse again is very thrilling."

Rademaker and Tutukin's ambitions extend beyond the stage. They are developing an education program of workshops and talks designed to encourage adults to engage with dance later in life, and they hope to foster cross-generational exchange between WINN dancers and younger professionals to share insights into building "healthy, sustainable, and happy careers," says Tutukin.

Asked whether WINN might influence established ballet companies, the pair imagine residencies and a repertoire for older dancers running alongside main-stage programming. "Junior companies are everywhere now," says Rademaker. "That's great. But let's also have the other side of the coin."