Death and legacy
Bausch died on 30 June 2009 in Wuppertal, North Rhine Westphalia, Germany, aged 68 of lung cancer five days after diagnosis.
Her work had an influence on modern dance from the 1970s forward.
The same year, choreographer and experimental theatre-maker Dimitris Papaioannou created a piece called Nowhere to inaugurate the renovated main stage of the Greek National Theatre in Athens. The show's central and most prolific scene was dedicated to the memory of Bausch, and involved performers linking arms and stripping naked a man and woman.
In 2010 the dance company Les Ballets C de la B performed Out of Context – for Pina, which was dedicated to Bausch's memory. The show was directed and conceived by the company's founder Alain Platel, for whom Bausch was a friend and mentor.
In 2010 the choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and dancer Shantala Shivalingappa premiered their work Play, which was dedicated to Bausch's memory. Bausch was the main impetus for the piece as she had brought Cherkaoui and Shivalingappa to collaborate in 2008 to perform for the final edition of her festival.
Wenders' documentary, Pina, was released in late 2011 in the United States, and is dedicated to her memory.
Works by Bausch were staged in June and July 2012 as a highlight of the Cultural Olympiad preceding the Olympic Games 2012 in London. The works were created when Bausch was invited to visit and stay in 10 global locations – in India, Brazil, Palermo, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Budapest, Istanbul, Santiago, Rome, and Japan – between 1986 and 2009. Seven of the works had not been seen in the UK.
Bausch's style has influenced performers such as David Bowie, who designed part of his 1987 Glass Spider Tour with Bausch in mind. For the tour, Bowie "wanted to bridge together some kind of symbolist theatre and modern dance" and used Bausch's early work as a guideline.
Florence and the Machine's vocalist, Florence Welch, has been influenced by Bausch's work. She said in a 2022 interview: "Pina has been one of the biggest influences on my life, especially on my performance style... Her work speaks to me in a way that is really hard to put into words, and I think that is the point of dance."
