is a French-German theatre director and writer based in Berlin. She studied theatre and cultural studies in Munich and Rennes before completing her directing studies at the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Arts in Berlin. Since 2021, she has worked as a director and author at state theatres and in the independent performing arts scene. Since 2024, her work has also included projects with children and young people, often from socially disadvantaged backgrounds.
Lorenz sees art as a way of reconnecting with aspects of the human experience unsually exclusively associated with childhood, like an appreciation of nonsense, aimless exploration and refusal to accept the ways of the world without question. Encouraging people of all ages to overcome the shame associated with such forms of enjoyment is at the core of Lorenz’s work. Having experienced loss at an early age, she believes in fostering resilience through humour and play. Creating relief from societal pressures through the shared phyiscal expression of laughter drives her tragic-comedic writing. In her art, Lorenz strives towards a multilingual and inclusive understanding of language, in which mundane, simple language can be deeply poetic. Rather than getting caught up in ideologies of linguistic mastery or, worse, purity, she embraces ‘languaging’ as a messy process of creation, with the potential to add flavours to our individual perception.
Lorenz grew up in rural Hesse, in a region shaped by the presence of U.S. military bases and American popular culture. Her father, a classical musician introduced her to the world of high culture. Experiencing it as unnecessarily serious and exclusive, Lorenz herself, from an early age, felt more drawn to the fun and accessibility of pop culture. The inner library of cultural references she has since been creating is a big part of her artistic practice. Drawing on popular music, films and other visual art, she is interested in pop culture’s power to weave individual memories into a collective experience. With her 2014 Bachelor thesis Seduction of the Incredulous – On the Postmodern Myth of Burning Man she started investigating contemporary ritualistic practices and how they can respond to the need for community in our hyper-individualistic, increasingly secular world.
In 2025, Lorenz was diagnosed with ADHD. The diagnosis prompted her to connect challenging experiences that had previously been difficult to grasp and often accompanied by shame. Since then, she has increasingly turned to more personal work, drawing from her biography. She has come to see neurodivergence as a perspective from which to challenge norms and their impact on happiness, connection and, ultimately, social justice. Her interest in mental health is closely connected to her broader artistic engagement with loneliness, belonging and the social conditions that shape our lives.