IETM MAPPING
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THE PERFORMING ARTS IN THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF
GERMANY By Esther Slevogt
Dido & Aeneas by Sasha Waltz © Sasha Waltz & Guests/Sebastian Bolesch
IETM - International network for contemporary performing arts October 2018 ISBN: 978-2-93087-38-7
IETM is supported by: The European Commission support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. IETM MAPPING
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The Performing Arts in the Federal Republic of Germany
IETM Mapping by Esther Slevogt
Esther Slevogt is an author and theatre critic living in Berlin. She is the editor and managing director of the theatre portal nachtkritik.de, which she co-founded in 2007, and architect of the Berlin conference Theater und Netz.
Published by IETM - International network for contemporary performing arts, Brussels October 2018
Editing and general coordination: Nan van Houte (IETM)
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THE PERFORMING ARTS IN THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY IETM MAPPING
www.ietm.org Contents
03 1. INTRODUCTION 03 2. STRUCTURE 04 3. SUPPORT 05 4. HISTORICAL FOUNDATIONS 06 5. AFTER 1945 06 6. IN THE WEST 07 7. IN THE EAST 08 8. WOMEN IN THE THEATRE 09 9. EXCURSUS ON DANCE 10 10. EDUCATION 11 11. THE BERLIN VOLKSBÜHNE CONTROVERSY 13 12. CITY THEATRE VERSUS PRODUCTION HOUSE 15 13. RIGHT-WING POPULIST CLIMATE CHANGE 16 14. THEATRE AND DIGITALISATION
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01. INTRODUCTION
The Federal Republic of Germany has the largest and densest network of institutional and independent theatres in the world. This range includes city, state and national theatres run by states and municipalities and commercially-run musical and entertainment stages, as well as a high density of independent theatres, dance companies and performance groups, which generally finance their work with funds from various state funding programs. The city and state theatres are the ideational Theater Freiburg (photo: © Marcel Korbel) and structural backbone of the German theatrical landscape, and their budgets are fixed items in the budgets of their respective cities or municipalities. These theatres are characterized by standing buildings, 02. permanent ensembles, and the permanent STRUCTURE presentation of artistic works, as well as by their employees who produce stage This city and state theatre system also these distribution circles. In addition, there sets and costumes for the productions. includes the well-known venues and are firmly established festivals in individual The repertoire of the respective theatre production houses of the independent venues, such as the International Summer exclusively contains these in house theatres (Freie Theater) which are Festival at Kampnagel in Hamburg or produced works. A special role is played by operated with public funds. These the international festival Tanz im August the state theatres, whose cultural-political programming institutions manage without in Berlin, which presents international mission also includes to perform in the standing ensembles but have permanent productions at the intersection of dance surrounding regions that do not have their technicians and an administration. and performance. In addition, the various own public theatre. As a rule, therefore, Independent groups and artists who want production houses organize smaller fewer than half of the performances take to work here must raise their project funds theme-oriented festivals again and again. place at the actual location of the respective themselves. Normally, however, they are This serves above all to bundle various state stage. The operation of theatres in the supported in this by the production houses. independent productions in order to give ensemble and repertoire system within Works produced in these houses also tour them more attention as a package, as well the dense network in this country is an through other houses of the network, as to enrich them with discursive and pop- internationally unique selling point for the which is not restricted to Germany but cultural events and to contextualize them German-speaking theatre landscape. also associated with – in between others once again in a differentiated way. – Gessnerallee in Zürich. In addition, there are a number of institutionalized festivals in the independent scene, such as the Dortmund festival Favoriten, the Berlin Performing Arts Festival, the dance and theatre festival Rodeo in Munich or the festival Hauptsache Frei in Hamburg. These festivals are important structural pillars in the overall structure of the independent scene and ensure high visibility of productions, as long as they have reached
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The most important production German and international context of the houses of the independent scene: performing arts, including production • https://www.hebbel-am-ufer.de manager, creative producer, company 03. • http://www.kampnagel.de manager, producer and others. There are • https://www.pact-zollverein.de many designations for a job description SUPPORT • http://fft-duesseldorf.de that has become increasingly important for • http://www.mousonturm.de the independent scene in recent years, but Project funding can be applied for at the • https://www.hellerau.org for which there has been no training so far. Cultural Foundation of the Federation • https://tanzhaus-nrw.de (Kulturstiftung des Bundes, KSB). Above • https://www.sophiensaele.com The umbrella organisation of the individual all, the KSB supports major projects with • http://theatrerampe.de independent groups and artists working innovation potential that also have an • https://www.gessnerallee.ch in Germany is the Federal Association international impact or are co-produced of Independent Performing Artists internationally. State cultural institutions Independent scene festivals (Bundesverband Freie Darstellende such as museums or theatres also apply • https://www.performingarts- Künste, BDFK), founded in 1990, which is here with special projects that they cannot festival.de one of the largest theatre associations in finance from their regular budgets. • http://www.hauptsachefrei.de the country: whether theatre and dance • http://rodeomuenchen.de houses, collectives or individual actors, the For the performing arts, the KSB has • http://www.favoriten-festival.de BDFK represents the interests of around launched the “Double Pass” (Doppelpass) • https://www.made-festival.de 20,000 theatre and dance professionals in programme (until 2021), which promotes • http://www.kampnagel.de/ the country at the federal level, organised cooperation projects and partnerships internationales-sommerfestival in a total of 16 regional associations and between institutional and independent • https://www.tanzimaugust.de three other associated organisations. An theatres. The aim of the fund is to example of these is the Berlin Federal State encourage the independent scene and Seven international co-producing houses Association of Independent Performing theatre institutions in Germany to try out in Germany have been united in an alliance Artists.(Berliner Landesverband Freie new, tour-ready forms of cooperation and since 2015. This association, which in the Darstellende Künste, LAFT), which was artistic production. last three years has received €12 million founded in 2008 to support Berlin’s in funding from the Ministry for Culture independent performing artists with According to the last published report, and Media, consists of the Künstlerhaus increased networking, training and lobbying the KSB distributed a total of around Mousonturm (Frankfurt am Main), the through representation, generating public €18 million in project funds in 2015, with Forum Freies Theater (Düsseldorf), Hebbel interest and offering services. The LAFT projects in the performing arts accounting am Ufer (HAU, Berlin), the European advocates, among other things, for lower for almost 24 percent. (Source: KSB Annual Centre of the Arts Hellerau (Dresden), limits on fixed payment in the assessment Report 2015) Kampnagel (Hamburg), PACT Zollverein of project funding. (Essen) and Tanzhaus NRW (Düsseldorf). The alliance thus unites the most important and largest production centres of the independent dance, theatre, and performance scene in Germany. The aim of this association is a more sustainable and substantial cooperation across states by independent artists and their productions, joint publications, and further development.
In 2018, for example, the alliance of international production houses offered further training for producers for the first time. Under the heading “Academy for Performing Arts Producers,” a series of advanced training events focused on imparting skills for producing in the Göttingen - Deutsches Theater (photo: Dietmar Schwanitz)
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The Performing Arts Fund (Fonds At present, the situation of the performing Darstellende Künste) was set up especially arts in Germany is marked by a paradox: for independent theatre and dance on the one hand, since the financial crisis, 04. productions and is endowed with €1.1 public funds for financing have no longer million annually by the state. The fund been made available as a matter of course. HISTORICAL FOUNDATIONS supports all fields of work and forms of Over the past decade, this has led to the arts in professional independently considerable losses in the substance of The development of the performing produced theatre and dance, and with its the German theatre landscape. In the arts in Germany is closely linked to the support would like to make a substantial meantime, theatre has become increasingly emancipation of the bourgeoisie. For contribution to the further development subject to economic legitimacy constraints this economically strong but practically of a diverse theatre, performance, and and culture as a whole is no longer a self- politically uninfluential stratum (until the fall dance landscape in Germany. Here, too, evident part of the self-image of cities and of the empire at the end of the First World the innovation potential of a project is an municipalities. This loss of significance War), the theatre became the central form important selection criterion for funding. of cultural events has also led to a sharp of self-understanding in the nineteenth decline in cultural reporting in recent years, century. As a result, city theatres became For projects to be realised in Berlin, funds particularly in the print media. Especially important centres of a new urban and can be applied for from the Capital City for smaller theatres and groups as well bourgeois culture. In this context, theatre Cultural Fund (Hauptstadtkulturfonds, as houses and projects outside the major has also played an important role in the HKF). cities, this poses problems in creating a development of parliamentary democracy public for their work. in Germany, which, like theatre, is a system In addition, there are regional cultural of representation. foundations in individual federal states, At the same time, the performing arts including the NRW Artistic Foundation in Germany are experiencing a surge The diverse German theatre landscape is (Kunststiftung NRW), the Danube Swabian in relevance as an accumulation point also due to the fact that it was not until Cultural Foundation of the Federal State of for political, social, and technological 1871 that Germany became a nation state Baden-Württemberg (Donauschwäbische developments. In the societies of the with a capital in Berlin. Until then, there Kulturstiftung des Landes Baden- digital age—increasingly defined by media, was a geographically and politically loosely Württemberg), the Hamburger Cultural technologies, and their staging and user defined structure of city-states and small Foundation (Hamburgische Kulturstiftung) interfaces—dance and theatre have states or principalities, whose royal cities and the Lower Saxony Foundation (Stiftung gained new emancipatory possibilities each had their own court or state stages. Niedersachsen). Occasionally, projects as instruments of physical experience Long before there was a German nation in the field of theatre / performing arts and self-assertion. For they can convey state, the cultivation of classical national are also supported by non-governmental methods and instruments for identifying, literature in the theatre had ensured a foundations such as the Heinz and Heide deciphering, and seeing through media relatively homogeneous cultural identity Dürr Foundation or the Rudolf-Augstein stagings as such—or for opposing them. of the German bourgeoisie in the various Foundation. small states. Almost every major city still has its own theatre, usually a so-called Supra-regional state foundations and funds: three-division stage with opera, drama, • https://www.kulturstiftung-des-bundes.de and ballet. • https://www.fonds-daku.de • http://www.hauptstadtkulturfonds.berlin.de Around 1800, authors such as Friedrich Schiller, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, and Regional state foundations and funds: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe saw theatre • http://www.kunststiftung-nrw.de as a social authority for the ethical and • http://www.stnds.de/ aesthetic education of mankind in the • http://www.dsksbw.de sense of the ideals of the Enlightenment: • https://www.kulturstiftung-hh.de the proverbial “moral institution,” as Schiller called the theatre in a famous speech Non-gouvernmental foundations: in 1796. It is here that the high status of • https://www.heinzundheideduerrstiftung.de theatre in the culture of this country and • http://www.rudolf-augstein-stiftung.de the self-image of many theatre makers as moral authorities and correctives of society
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and politics is still rooted today. The important role of the performing 05. 06. arts in German culture was further strengthened by the politicisation of the AFTER 1945 IN THE WEST arts in the years around the First World War. In the course of this politicisation, After the end of the Second World In the FRG, the city theatre underwent the first ideas of anti-institutional, open War, two German states emerged: the a restoration after 1945 as a centre of forms of theatre were developed, which Federal Republic of Germany, or FRG civic education, structurally supported already in the 1920s had radically turned (Bundesrepublik Deutschland—BRD) with by the constitutional cultural sovereignty away from bourgeois theatre aesthetics its capital in Bonn, which was integrated of the individual federal states. This and its institutions. Already in the Weimar into Western alliances, and the German decentralisation of cultural policy was Republic (1919-1933) free play groups, Democratic Republic, or GDR (Deutsche the consequence of the experience of the often occupied by laymen, were formed— Demokratische Republik—DDR) with its abuse of centrally controlled cultural and so-called agitprop groups—which were capital in East Berlin, which belonged to the educational policy under the dictatorship no longer tied to fixed houses and forms Soviet Union’s sphere of influence. From of National Socialism. It was only in the of organisation. However, since these 1961 to 1989 Berlin was divided by a wall years following reunification (or the groups had essentially been founded in the into an eastern and a western part. GDR’s accession to the FRG) that a central environment of the Communist Party for representative in charge of cultural policy the education and agitation of the workers, It was not until the mid-1960s that the first at the federal level was created again. their development was severely restricted independent groups in the states of the FRG However, the “Ministry of State for Culture by state censorship in the early 1930s. resumed the anti-institutional movement and Media” is not truly a ministry (nor does The National Socialists finally ended this of the pre-war period. It is no coincidence the “minister” have the rank of minister) development by force in 1933. that the first centres of independent but is assigned to the Federal Chancellery. theatre in the Federal Republic of Germany The current incumbent is CDU politician were established in areas where there was Monika Grütters. a highly developed working-class culture during the Weimar Republic. Berlin and After 1945, the development of state North Rhine-Westphalia are therefore still theatres into leading theatres in the old important centres of independent theatre Federal Republic of Germany was strongly in this country. In the GDR, there was never favoured not only by decentralised cultural a noteworthy independent scene due to its policy, but also by the disappearance of institutionally fixed and strongly centrally Berlin as an important theatre centre controlled cultural policy. of the country. Theatres such as the Schauspielhaus Bochum, the Deutsche Schauspielhaus in Hamburg, the Münchner Kammerspiele, the Deutsche Theater in Göttingen and the Theater Bremen have risen to become nationally important theatres.
In West Berlin, only in the 1960s did a theatre move into the upper league of the important German stages: The Schaubühne am Halleschen Ufer, founded in 1962 by a group of young artists led by directors Peter Stein, Claus Peymann, Frank-Patrick Steckel, and Klaus Michael Grüber, dramaturge Dieter Sturm, stage designer Karl-Ernst Hermann, playwright Botho Strauß, and actors Edith Clever, Mittelreich/ Münchner Kammerspiele, Director: Anna-Sophie Mahler (photo ©Judith Busse)
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Jutta Lampe, and Bruno Ganz. The Schaubühne not only broke up the central perspective of the peep-box stage, 07. which was still common at the time, but also the hierarchically organized institutional IN THE EAST decision-making structures in favour of a model of parity and co-determination, In the GDR, an initial attempt was made first three decades of the 20th century as and committed itself to a radical, critical after 1945 to take up the various avant- a private-run theatre, came to be world- contemporaneity. Not only classical and garde movements of the Weimar Republic, renowned, and after 1945 it became the antique literature was reinterpreted, but including their efforts to open up the national theatre of the GDR. also plays by Bertolt Brecht, who was theatre both in terms of content and boycotted as a communist by the theatres institution. But these efforts were quickly Until 1989, theatre in the GDR fulfilled in West Germany and especially in Austria stifled by Stalinist cultural policy hostile a function that was as complex as it was between 1953 and 1963, and whose plays to the avant-garde. In the end, attempts at contradictory, between the counter-public, also had a hard time on West German renewal in the GDR, which also included opposition, and cultural self-assertion stages for a long time afterwards. Today opening up new strata of the working class, towards the west German Federal Republic the Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz, as it were limited to the institutions of city and during the Cold War. In 1955, the Federal has been called since its move to Berlin’s state theatres. Cultural policy, which was Republic of Bonn declared itself to be Kurfürstendamm in the 1980s, is directed strongly concentrated on the centre of East the only legitimate representative of the by Thomas Ostermeier and is one of the Berlin, meant that small provincial stages, Germans. While in the 1950s some West most internationally successful German which could operate at a safe distance German artists still went to the GDR out of theatres. from the focus of attention of the ruling conviction, including Wolf Biermann, Peter SED state party, could temporarily grow Hacks, and the director Brigitte Soubeyran, After the Berlin Wall was built, Berlin’s into development sites for avant-garde GDR artists from the 1960s onwards disappearance as a German theatre centre theatre. Thus the theatres in Anklam und increasingly failed due to the restrictive for the West also led to the founding of the Parchim (Mecklenburg) or Nordhausen state cultural policy in East Berlin and left Berlin’s Theatertreffen: once a year, top (Harz) became centres of development for the GDR for the FRG. These artists, who productions of German-language theatre idiosyncratic artistic talents, including Adolf had moved from the GDR to the FRG, were to be concentrated in West Berlin. Dresen, Frank Castorf, Leander Haußmann, modernised West German theatre since Founded in 1964 as a child of the Cold War, and Armin Petras. Among the important the 1970s. Between them such names as the annual festival has undergone many GDR theatres outside Berlin before 1989 Peter Palitzsch, Heinar Kipphardt, Thomas changes since then. Its core, however, is still were the theatre in Karl-Marx-Stadt (now Brasch, Adolf Dresen, Matthias Langhoff, ten outstanding productions of German- Chemnitz), the theatres in Schwerin and and Manfred Karge. Of Brecht’s successors language theatre, which are selected by a Cottbus, and the Volkstheater Rostock. as influential authors and theatre-makers, jury of critics and invited to Berlin every Overall, the aesthetic innovation potential Heiner Müller in particular should be May as guest performances. Theatertreffen of GDR theatre was significantly greater mentioned, who in the 1980s held the rank is the most important German-language than that of the Federal Republic. of unofficial national poet in both German theatre festival and is strongly focused on states. institutional theatre productions. The most important dramatist and director Festivals for independent theatre, the for the development of German theatre in selection of which is not curated by the the 20th century, Bertolt Brecht, returned production side but based on the decision from American emigration to the eastern of an independent jury, include the Politik sector of Berlin after the end of the war. im Freien Theater festival, which is held There he first worked under the roof of every four years in changing German the Deutsches Theater before he moved cities by the Federal Centre for Political into the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm with Education, or the Impulse festival in the his Berliner Ensemble in 1954, which still federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia, subsists on its reputation as the “Brecht which, however, has lost considerable theatre” today, but is hardly committed importance in recent years. to its traditions. The Deutsches Theater, led by Max Reinhardt, the inventor of the directorial theatre in Germany, during the
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08. WOMEN IN THE THEATRE
Moreover, the first woman at the head of a theatre was the actress Helene Weigel, director of the Berliner Ensemble in the GDR by 1949. After her death in 1971, she was succeeded by her deputy Ruth Berghaus, who directed the theatre until 1977 and was also an internationally- acclaimed director until her death in 1996. It was not until the late 1980s that the first women in West Germany reached leading positions in theatres. While in the GDR there were already The conference ‘Burning Issues’ at Theatre Bonn (photo: Thilo Beu) a few women directing in the 1950s, theatre in the West was a purely male artistic director in Saarbrücken and now In March 2018, acting director Nicola domain until the fall of the Berlin Wall in in Braunschweig, and Shermin Langhoff, Bramkamp organised the conference 1989. who heads Berlin’s Maxim Gorki Theater. “Burning Issues” at the Theater in Bonn, In terms of equal pay for men and women where gender equality in German Even today, only a few women occupy in the cultural sector (referring to the theatres was discussed for the first executive positions in theatres. According gender pay gap), Germany is also the time and a list of demands was adopted. to a study conducted by the German worst performer in Europe. Actors usually Co-organizers of Burning Issues include Cultural Council in 2016, only 24% of earn a third more than actresses. The Nicola Bramkamp and the Bochum German directors are women. Among theatre critic and nachtkritik.de editor actress Lisa Jopt, who is also one of the artistic directors, you can find only 22% Anne Peter published comprehensive co-founders of the Ensemble Network. women, including Karin Beier, who first research on the topic in the summer of headed the Schauspiel Köln and now 2018 in the online theatre magazine The Ensemble Network represents the runs the Hamburg Schauspielhaus, nachtkritik.de. interests of theatre professionals who Dagmar Schlingmann, the first female work to improve working conditions at the theatres, including more family- friendly working hours and fairer pay. Its motto is “The freedom of art does not mean the bondage of artists.” In a climate in which the mostly male artistic genius can rule unrestricted in the supposed sense of art and actors or performers only have the status of material in the context of an artistic work, the chances of abuse of power are very high.
But change has finally begun. Collective, equal functions, which have long been common in the independent scene, are also gaining ground in institutional theatre. Therefore, in productions by director Yael Ronen (born 1976)— working at Berlin’s Gorki Theatre and Anna Bergmann (photo © TheaterKarlsruhe) the Munich’s Kammerspiele, among
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other places—performers are always also credited as co-authors. Director Anna Bergmann (born 1978), who has headed the acting department of the state theatre in Karlsruhe since the beginning of this season, has announced that she intends to work exclusively with female directors there. In doing so, she wants to create a counterweight in the still strongly male- dominated directing industry. This coup even inspired the New York Times to report from Karlsruhe.
In response to these debates and developments, the German Stage Association (Deutscher Bühnenverein), the interest group and employers’ association of German theatres, adopted a code of conduct at its annual conference in June 2018, which is intended to Pina Bausch (photo: AP Photo/Michael Probst) regulate how to deal with and how to prevent abuse of power and sexual assault in theatre. 09. EXCURSUS ON DANCE
The revolutionary movements in art and initially at the Folkwangschule in Essen, society in the 1920s also particularly one of Germany’s most renowned dance affected dance in Germany. The highly schools to this day. Since 1973, till her formalized movement language of death in 2009, she has been the director classical ballet was not only attacked as an of the ballet division of the Wuppertal expression and relic of the courtly culture Theatre, which has led her to world fame. of feudalism, which was finally being overcome after 1918, but was also seen In the GDR, Gret Palucca resumed her in principle as the epitome of man’s being work in Hellerau near Dresden immediately overlain by a social order that was hostile after the end of the war, where important to his interests of freedom. In particular, innovators of dance such as Émile-Jacques expressive dance had the goal of working Dalcroze and Rudolf von Laban had worked back to the natural movements of the body. before 1933. But she repeatedly came In contrast to classical ballet, the beginning into conflict with the avant-garde-hostile of the 20th century saw the emergence of dogmatists in state and party leadership. a new form of ballet. Due to the strong The important choreographer and opera dominance of German artists or artists director Ruth Berghaus was born at her working in Germany, this was soon called school. Until today the Dresden Palucca “New German Dance.” National Socialism School is one of the leading educational put a permanent end to this development. institutions for modern and classical dance in Germany. In dance theatre in West Germany, it was not until the 1960s that Kurt-Jooss student Pina Bausch was able to effectively tie in with the demolished avant-garde tradition,
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years with choreographic projects with All educational establishments with Berlin immigrant children from socially university or higher education status: marginalized groups. Thus dance theatre 10. http://tanzplan-deutschland.de/ has also occupied a new social function as EDUCATION tanzausbildung_deutschland. a medium of integration. In recent years, php?id_language=1 dance has also shown convincing ways of Many federal states maintain their own being a threshold medium and initiation top-class state training centres for theatre instrument for cultural education and and dance. As a consequence of the division Since 1990, only dancer and choreographer participation. This is because it offers of the city, Berlin is doubly equipped in Sasha Waltz has succeeded in catching the possibility of interaction between many areas. The state training centres up with Pina Bausch both nationally and people of the most diverse backgrounds for drama, dance, choreography and internationally. In contrast to Pina Bausch, beyond age, language, or educational directing usually have university or college Sasha Waltz comes from the independent barriers. Even the “Interest Group of status. However, there are strong access dance scene before she became co-director Cities with Theatrical Guest Productions” restrictions. Furthermore, it is always only of the Berlin Schaubühne together with (Interessensgemeinschaft der Städte mit a fraction of the applicants who pass the director Thomas Ostermeier in 2000 Theatergastspielen, INTHEGA), which tough entrance exams. Anyone who speaks after the final end of the Peter Stein era. has so far focused strongly on spoken, German with an accent has little chance of She was one of the co-founders of the musical and light comedic theatre, is now getting a place for classical acting training independent Berlin venue Sophiensaele increasingly trying to integrate modern at a state institution. and is now co-operator of her own venue dance theatre and performance into its in Berlin, the Radialsystem. Since the programme. INTHEGA organises cities State theatre academies: beginning of the 2018/19 season she has without their own theatre and outside of https://www.hfs-berlin.de been artistic director of the Berlin State the federal state stages, which therefore https://www.udk-berlin.de Ballet—together with Johannes Öhmann. have to organise the basic cultural provision https://www.hfmt-hamburg.de of their citizens with theatre elsewhere. https://www.theaterakademie.de Modern dance theatre still has a hard https://www.hmtm-hannover.de time asserting itself in the three-division https://www.hmdk-stuttgart.de operation of state or community stages, https://www.hmt-leipzig.de where classical ballet still dominates today. https://www.hmt-rostock.de One exception is the Theater Heidelberg, https://www.folkwang-uni.de where the choreographer Johann Kresnik was already active in the 1980s and until recently the choreographer Nanine Linning was very successful with her dance theatre. The ballet companies of the city and state theatres—in contrast to the acting ensembles—have an international structure, as the German city theatre system offers attractive working conditions for well-trained dancers from all over the world.
With its focus on contemporary forms of dance and performance, the government’s funding policy of recent years has also made the Federal Republic of Germany interesting in the independent sector for international artists. Artists like the Argentine choreographer Constanza Macras work both in the city theatre and in the independent scene, where Macras Mittelreich Schwarzkopie/ Münchner Kammerspiele, Director: Anta Helena Recke has been creating a furor for several (photo ©JudithBuss)
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The theoretical and practical innovation elite of the German theatre and performance scene came for a long time from the Institute for Applied Theatre Studies at the Justus Liebig University in Gießen. In the tradition of Bertolt Brecht’s Epic Theatre, the students learned to think along with the conditions of the respective form of representation in their theatre works. In Gießen, the term “post-dramatic theatre” was coined around 1990 by founding director Andrzej Wirth and the theatre scholar Hans-Thies Lehmann: for a theatre whose basis no longer necessarily has to be a dramatic text. Giessen graduates who contemporary theatre has to thank for its characteristic impulses include the director and playwright René Pollesch, Volksbühne in the Castorf era with Räuberrad (photo: Wikimedia commons) the documentary theatre-maker Hans- Werner Kroesinger and the members of the performance groups Rimini Protokoll, Gob Squad, and She She Pop, who also conquered the city theatres from the 11. independent scene. In the meantime, the degree program Cultural Studies THE BERLIN VOLKSBÜHNE and Aesthetic Practice at the University of Hildesheim has also earned itself a CONTROVERSY reputation as a cadre forge for a growing In reunited Germany, after 1989 the broken heart of Europe: the intersection theatre and performance avant-garde. Berliner Volksbühne under artistic director of two ideologically and technologically Performance groups like machina eX, Frank Castorf became the style-shaping highly equipped systems, between East Henrike Iglesias, or Markus & Markus theatre of the young Berlin Republic: a and West, between communism and emerged from the Hildesheim school. melting pot of artists from East and West— capitalism. Many Volksbühne productions and also a meeting place for the audience of the Castorf era repeatedly inspected from East and West. Besides Frank Castorf, the chasms and ideologies of the fatal 20th the Volksbühne was particularly associated century – whose fallout we can see in the with the names of artists from East and present in the ghosts of totalitarianism that West Germany, Austria, and Switzerland are reappearing and threaten democracy such as Christoph Marthaler, Christoph everywhere. Schlingensief, René Pollesch, Herbert Fritsch, and the stage designer Bert Whether it was Frank Castorf’s sensational Neumann (1960-2015). The Volksbühne Dostoevsky adaptations, Christoph under Frank Castorf produced a resistant Marthaler’s musically melancholic and unmistakable aesthetic that worked its lost landscapes, René Pollesch’s lucid way through the existential cracks of the discourse comedies about the individual only superficially reunited Berlin, which dissolving under the pressure of neoliberal were at the same time the cracks of Europe. exploitation economies, or Christoph Schlingensief’s provocative theatrical The divided city, which Berlin was actions aimed at the hypocritical facades just three years before Frank Castorf of consumption and consensus: the basic took office as artistic director at Rosa- theme of the Volksbühne was the assertion Luxemburg-Platz in 1992, was not only of the individual in an ever more unleashed Germany’s heart of darkness but also the neoliberalism, which could not be tamed
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by any enemy after 1989. An essential overwhelmed. As well, his plans seemed to had long been shown on other stages or element in this was taking the side of the have little substance. Despite a preparation festivals in Berlin—a programme that had “humiliated and insulted,” whose voices and budget of €3 million, his team was not already been covered by festivals and other life stories no longer attracted attention able to present a complete season. So the production houses such as the Haus der after the victory of capitalism. This theatre big theatre often remained closed due Berliner Festspiele and the Hebbel am Ufer was loved by its audience is East and West to a lack of programme. A few expensive (HAU) in Berlin and therefore no longer equally and was also internationally one of guest performances cost a lot of money, found an audience in the Volksbühne. the most famous stages in Europe. while the permanent employees of the theatre remained unoccupied. Dercon also In the years 2015-2018, a front line The end of Frank Castorf’s artistic showed little skill in talking to the city and emerged in particular from the struggles for directorship in 2015, unprofessionally its audience, so that the few performances the Berlin Volksbühne: city theatre versus forced by Berlin’s cultural policy, triggered often played in front of half-empty rows. production house. The plan of Chris Dercon a year-long cultural struggle. Over 40,000 Eight months after the start of the first and the then Berlin Cultural Administration people, including leading artists and season for which he was responsible, was to transform the Volksbühne, which intellectuals of the country, petitioned Dercon gave up. had been set up as a city theatre with a for the preservation of the theatre. The repertoire system, into a production house immature plan of the politicians was Dercon’s proponents, as well as Dercon with a seasonal system. Both Dercon and to transform the Volksbühne into an himself, have repeatedly tried to reduce Berlin politicians, however, concealed from international production house that would the conflict provoked by his appointment the public this structural change they were work cross-sectorial. But the Castorf- and his failure to an antagonism of national striving for. Instead, an attempt was made Volksbühne, where crossover projects by versus international. In fact, however, to push this change through the back door visual artists or film directors as well as Castorf’s Volksbühne had an unmistakable without public debate. The protest in the dance theatre were regularly residing, had signature that had made it one of the city was also aimed at this process, which always done this; first Johann Kresnik’s most interesting theatres in Europe was so fierce because these structural ensemble, later Meg Stuart and her dancers internationally. Dercon, on the other hand, questions had and have an exemplary worked here. presented an interchangeable programme character. The question behind this is to that was essentially taken from the glossy what extent this country can and wants to Chris Dercon, originally a museum curator catalogues of the European dance and continue to afford its unique but expensive and presented as Castorf’s successor, was performance scene, some of whose works theatre system.
The Mirror Barricade (Die Spiegelbarrikade) by Theater Dortmund (photo © Flint Stelter)
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12. CITY THEATRE VERSUS PRODUCTION HOUSE Compared to the independent scene, city and state theatres were long regarded as structurally immobile, less innovative, and more committed to the preservation of cultural heritage. For a long time these institutions were dominated by the trust in a homogeneous audience rooted for generations in Germany. This was reflected in repertoire policies as well as Roma Armee, Director: Yael Ronen/Gorki Theater Berlin in the composition of the ensembles. It (photo: © Ute Langkafel/Maifoto) was not until the last two decades that institutionalised theatre began to open changed the demands placed on theatrical roots could question their cultural identity up and no longer orient itself exclusively narratives. for the first time. Shermin Langhoff, by towards the idea of a national core that time commissioned by Matthias culture. In times of tight public finances, it Well before the term “Audience Lilienthal (who was Frank Castorf’s chief had been forced to redefine its function as Development” became a marketing dramaturge at the Berlin Volksbühne from a representative centre of urban culture. instrument in city theatre dramaturgies, 1991-1998) as curator of the festival, independent venues such as Kampnagel soon brought the concept to supra- Theatre audiences in Germany have in Hamburg, the FFT in Düsseldorf, the regional fame in her own small theatre, diversified in recent decades, as has Berlin Sophiensäle or the HAU under the Ballhaus Naunynstrasse in Kreuzberg, the society of the Federal Republic of Matthias Lilienthal had shown how this Berlin, where it was extended to other Germany as a whole, which long since could be done: namely, by offering events post-migrant subcultures. been made up of people with the most for the most diverse target and interest diverse cultural roots and educational groups. Also for those who no longer saw Shermin Langhoff took over as artistic contexts and can no longer be reached their demands on cultural education and director of the Maxim Gorki Theater in with the classical bourgeois educational entertainment necessarily fulfilled in a Berlin in 2013. Since then, this theatre has canon—social realities that have long been theatre evening alone, but also in events been drawing its material decidedly from ignored by city and state theatres. such as symposia on socio-political topics the horizons of immigrants and social or, influenced by pop culture, mixed forms minorities—looking for new material for However, these realities have long of reading, performance, and concert. a new audience, which has so far found been a structural and content-related itself and its cultural identity insufficiently component of the independent scene, In the context of the search for new represented in German theatre. The which has always been a decisive motor audiences, independent theatre also Gorki Theatre employs artists from a for the development of the performing discovered a part of German society that wide variety of countries, including Israel, arts in Germany. There, wide varieties had previously been completely ignored Turkey, Russia, and the former Yugoslav of formats—from performance by city theatres: the descendants of those republics. The Gorki Theatre is also home to documentary theatre, devised who had come to Germany since the to an exile ensemble in which actors performances to free adaptations of 1960s as immigrants, so-called “guest from Syria, Afghanistan, and Palestine classical material, interdisciplinary workers”, and who had stayed here. They are represented. On stage, not only the projects or symposia with socio-political now account for almost one fifth of the classical stage German is spoken, but content—were able to open up completely German population. It was Matthias also English, Arabic, Hebrew, or Turkish— new audiences. These include a young Lilienthal, director of the Berlin HAU, sometimes all at the same time. generation that grew up with digital who founded the first theatre festival for media and technologies, whose viewing post-migrant culture Beyond Belonging in The Gorki Theatre, however, is a city habits and cultural techniques have since 2005, where German artists with Turkish theatre. For a long time now, the equation
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independent scene = innovation, city that you are white?” Recke explained her has discovered its potential as an “image theatre = conservative is no longer procedure in an interview. “How can I factor” for the marketing of cities and applicable. On the contrary: in contrast make visible something as invisible as regions. Here, too, the congruence of to the independent scene, publicly whiteness? If you want to show something interests between the independent scene financed city and state theatres offer that exists, you have to make it again, and the economy harbours the potential comparatively secure production and but change one thing: the deviation in for social conflict. Various independent working conditions that also leave the repetition. You can see this thing for artists joined forces in Berlin in 2012 sufficient scope for innovation. Here, a itself then.” And this deviation was that in order to speak as a lobby group with long-term, reliable artistic development the predominantly white audience of the a common voice towards politics. This within the secured structures is possible. Munich Kammerspiele suddenly heard Coalition of the Independent Scene Such theatre artists as Christoph an urban Bavarian story told by black in Berlin successfully negotiated with Schlingensief (1960-2010), René Pollesch, actors and was thus confronted with the politicians to participate in the income the performative extreme installations question: what do terms like “home” or from the overnight-stay tax for tourists. of the duo Vegard Vinge and Ida Müller, “German” actually mean—who belongs to and the performance and installation them and who is excluded from them? At the same time, activists groups artists of the SIGNA group, that had a easily suspect independent artists huge influence on the independent scene, In contrast to city and state theatres, and companies of going along with the emerged, were supported and sometimes the artistic production conditions of the gentrifiers—of being their vanguard, so even discovered by institutional theatres. independent scene, due to their lean to speak. Since 2015, this has played a Christoph Schlingensief, for example, who and often project-based structures, also role in the debates about the successor began as an independent filmmaker, was fundamentally fit in the profile of what it to Frank Castorf as artistic director of the first asked by the city theatre (the Berlin means to work in neoliberalism. Projects Berliner Volksbühne. A high point of this Volksbühne) to work for the stage in of the independent scene thus breathe Kulturkampf was the occupation of the the 1990s and realized his most famous “the new spirit of capitalism”, as described Volksbühne in September 2017 under works here. by Luc Boltanski and Ève Chiapello in the leadership of a loosely organized their famous book. The unbound, flexible collective called Staub zu Glitzer Where could the influential and and also technically—regarding social (Dust to Glitter). Young people who provocative practices of artistic security—self-employed “independent” wanted to protest against gentrification representation by the city and state creative is defined as a role model for and expropriation of urban space by theatres better be questioned than in neoliberal deregulated employment commercial interests—including the those theatres themselves? At the Munich relationships. processes surrounding the installation Kammerspiele, the young Afro-German of Chris Dercon—came together under director and performer Anta Helena Moreover, in recent years independent this name. After a few days Dercon had to Recke staged the so-called “black copy” theatre has increasingly become the have the theatre cleared forcibly by the of a successful production of the house. target of the creative economy, which police. Based on an autobiographical novel by the Bavarian actor Sepp Bierbichler, Mittelreich tells the story of a Bavarian innkeeper family in the province over three generations. Director Anna-Sophie Mahler had successfully staged the family epic about home and German history at the Münchner Kammerspiele in 2015. Two years later, Anta Helena Recke staged an exact copy of this production, which, however, was exclusively cast with Afro-German actors and actresses.
“My initial question was, how can I make you experience in the theatre the resounding disillusionment you have Die Toten kommen, Aktion vom Zentrum für Politische Schönheit / Gorki Theater Berlin when you understand for the first time (photo © Nick Jaussi / ZPS)
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every evening, simply switched off the light European border policy who had drowned that would otherwise illuminate the square in the Mediterranean, in order to bury the 13. and Gottfried Semper’s magnificent neo- dead in front of the Federal Chancellery. Baroque building as bright as daylight. In The police had forbidden the carrying RIGHT-WING POPULIST 2016, the Dortmund Theatre used the along of an excavator that would have CLIMATE CHANGE methods of action art—a mirror barricade— been necessary to inter them. On June 21, to disrupt a march of neo-Nazis in the city 2015, thousands of people marched on Increased migration from crisis and war who had travelled from all over Germany: the Federal Chancellery to demonstrate zones in recent years, has put society with the help of inflatable balloons made against the daily tragedies at sea, where under a pressure which is fuelling fears of mirror foil, which can be classified art- hundreds of people drowned every day that are increasingly playing into the historically somewhere between Andy (and still drown today), and demand the hands of right-wing populists. On the one Warhol’s Silver Clouds and Christo’s “Land- reception of refugees in Germany. At hand, the different cultures and ways of Art Projects.” the end, the large meadow in front of life in German society pose new questions In 2015, when hundreds of thousands of the Reichstag in Berlin was covered with and challenges to theatres. Who is the people reached Germany who had to leave small symbolic graves that the people had audience? How must the traditional canon their homelands because of need or war, spontaneously erected there. change? How can diversity in society also the theatres also took part in helping these be reflected on stage? people, converting artists dressing rooms Action artists such as the Centre for into emergency shelters for refugees, Political Beauty use public space as a Theatres (such as the Maxim Gorki Theater offering cultural programmes, or simply stage. But this public space also inherently in Berlin or the Münchner Kammerspiele) collecting donations. The online theatre includes the digital public space, which has that are looking for answers to these magazine nachtkritik.de has documented already for a long time been incorporated questions, are facing growing pressure these countless activities in a long list. in the analogue space—with the social from right-wing conservative to right- networks, for example. Many of the wing populist forces, which have gained In this context, Amelie Deuflhardt, the satirical and subversive actions of the Peng! increased importance in Germany in recent director of the Hamburg Kulturfabrik collective, an association of artists, activists, years. Right-wing populists do not want a Kampnagel, was reported to the authorities craftspeople, and researchers in Berlin, can diverse society, but insist on a diffuse, by the AfD for “aid to the violation of the also be located in that context. A campaign ethnically defined concept of tradition. right of residence for foreigners.” She, too, against an advertising campaign of the Right-wing populists expect the theatre to had offered refugees accommodation at German armed forces, Bundeswehr-Hack, preserve and strengthen German identity the premises of the Kulturfabrik. As a result, became famous in particular. Peng! built a (whatever that may be) and culture, as well the Hamburg public prosecutor’s office had mock website that warned of the dangers as doing so for a sense of belonging to the to initiate preliminary proceedings against and horrors of war and the army instead homeland. Since right-wing populist parties her, which were, however, discontinued at of promoting attractive job opportunities such as the AfD (Alternative for Germany) the end. with he armed forces as on the original or movements such as PEGIDA (Patriots site. Within a very short time, the Peng! against the Islamisation of the Occident) One of the most spectacular actions of version of the Bundeswehr website beat have become more and more popular this time was the project The Dead Come the real site of the Bundeswehr in Google in Germany, theatres in the cities have by the action artists of the Centre for rankings. While the original campaign cost often decidedly positioned themselves Political Beauty led by Philipp Ruch in June the Ministry of Defence €10.6 million, as bastions of civility and defenders of an 2016. At a Muslim cemetery in Berlin, a Peng!, by their own account, spent only open society—both independent theatres burial was organized for a young woman about €100. The group has just received and city theatres. who had drowned with her baby in the the Aachen Peace Prize. Mediterranean Sea while fleeing Syria and Thus the Munich Residenztheater hung who had allegedly been recovered from a giant banner with the inscription a mass grave by the activists. The action REGIDA on its façade, which made deliberately left open whether this funeral fun of the supporters of the PEGIDA was real or just an artistic action. On the movement (REGIDA = Residenztheater following day, the people were called against the Idiotisation of the Occident). upon to join a funeral procession into The Semperoper in Dresden, on whose the government quarter, walking behind forecourt the PEGIDA movement marched the coffins of those other victims of the
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14. THEATRE AND DIGITALISATION Digitalisation has long since begun to reformat the performing arts, even though many theatre makers did not really want to admit this for a long time. They were of the opinion that their art form was a purely analogue one and therefore not affected by the consequences of digitisation. But digitisation not only creates new cultural techniques, it also changes the old ones. Non-linear, interactive narrative forms, as are the rule in digital media or computer The Hairs Of Your Head Are Numbered, by Chris Kondek + Christiane Kühl / games, have led to the development of Doublelucky productions (photo: Kim Albrecht) new theatre formats and narrative styles. The performance group Machina eX of spectators during the performance develops evenings which have several and projected their sensitive data onto a This has led to the emergence of the optional courses of action. Which course screen. The last production The Hairs Of Master’s programme Play and Object, the story takes depends decisively on the Your Head Are Numbered made it possible the first year of which began in the winter participation of the spectators and the to experience how humans are themselves semester of 2018/19 and, according decisions they make in the course of the becoming cyborgs by means of live to its own statement, has undertaken performance. The group Prinzip Gonzo surveillance technology—not only through interdisciplinary artistic research at the builds interactive theatre evenings as open medical digital surveillance via apps and interface between “the utopia of the playful world game arrangements, which would not smartwatches, but also through their and the social relevance of objects in a work without the participating audience. permanent self-representation in social contemporary, mediatized, social context: The Berlin network Invisible Playground, a media and the constantly growing need to for a theatre in the age of the Internet collective of game designers, visual artists, control their own external perception. of Things.” The Berlin object and puppet theatre makers, musicians, theorists, and theatre Schaubude organises the annual practitioners, is developing art projects These increasingly immersive works of art festival “Theatre of Things” (Theater der and game arrangements that use analogue don’t imply an audience which just stands Dinge), which focuses on experimental and digital urban space as a platform. facing. Instead, the audience becomes part developments in the field of contemporary The suggestive and elaborate long-term of the artwork and co-produces what it puppetry and object theatre. installations of the SIGNA group make simultaneously consumes, as a “pro-sumer.” their stories accessible only to viewers The stage in Germany that deals who actively roam these installations, play In particular, digitisation has given object most offensively and creatively with along, talk to performers, or the figures and puppet theatre a new relevance. questions of theatre and digitisation is they embody. Here the transitions between physical the Dortmund Theatre. Here, the further and virtual objects are just as fluid as the digital development of theatre aesthetics The duo Chris Kondek and Christiane animation of figures and objects by players is being researched beyond the use of Kühl present interactive performances or computer programs. The vocational new technologies. The Internet and its under the label Double-Lucky Productions, training in puppetry at the Berlin Academy effects on society are subject of artistic which made the audience experience in of Dramatic Arts opened already some contemplation in several directions. To concrete terms how surveillance works. years ago a department dealing with the this end, the Dortmund Theatre was For the Anonymus P. project in 2013, implementation of digital media in puppet converted into a technological workshop they collaborated for the first time with and object theatre in order to investigate of the future, alliances were forged with hackers who hacked the smartphones new paths in the aesthetic practice of Internet activists, hackers, technicians, theatrical narrative for several years now. and developers of hardware and software.
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According to the Dortmund Theatre every demands in a world that broadcasts via Since 2013, the Theater und Netz theatre dramaturgy needs a programmer. thousands of channels whose emissions conference in Berlin has been bundling At the same time, the theatre has redefined the individual can hardly process in the knowledge and issues of theatre and its mission as a “moral institution” for the simultaneity: a suggestive and powerful digitisation. The founders and organisers digital age, i.e., to show theatre productions high-tech opera and scenic installation are the theatre portal nachtkritik.de and that explain the risks and side effects of whose flood of simultaneous images and the Heinrich Böll Foundation. Theater und the digital age. In addition, the Dortmund stories threatens to drown the spectators. Netz examines to what extent the upheavals Theatre has dedicated itself to the idea of of digitalisation have consequences for the theatre as an institution for learning For Kay Voges, who was born in Düsseldorf the theatre from various perspectives. digital media competence: the theatre as a in 1972, the essential question for his The topics range from information for moral institution 4.0. theatrical work is how one can confront and theatre people about digital possibilities for help shape technology in the digital age, communication, marketing, and audience Thus an evening was created at the both as a theatre maker and as a spectator, development and a positioning of the Dortmund Theatre about people who, instead of being at its mercy and leaving performing arts in the network society, on behalf of Facebook in the Philippines, the field to the Internet companies. For towards aesthetic, technological and socio- have to spend murderously long shifts Voges this also applies to the development political questions. Under the pressure of looking at and deleting all the violent and and design of content on the Internet, digitalisation, the classical bourgeois public pornographic images that are uploaded which has so far been dominated by sphere, which had previously also been the daily to Facebook worldwide. Because private-sector corporations. “We need site of the theatre, is also eroding. In this neither filters nor algorithms can cope to learn to master this technology, but disruption scenario, which is currently with these floods of cruel images. (Moritz also to understand how the Internet rearranging the relationship between artist, Riesewieck / Laokoon Group: In Manila). and digitalisation are transforming our artwork, and audience, the performing The Internet activist and researcher society,” says Voges. In February 2018 the arts must reposition themselves. Artists, Arne Vogelgesang and his group Internil founding event for an Academy for Theatre theatre makers, technicians, politicians and presented various evenings that evaluate and Digitality (Akademie für Theater und net activists meet for discussion at Theater videos by extremists of all kinds on YouTube Digitalität) took place at the Dortmund und Netz. The conference sees itself as a and pursue the question: where does Theatre. In cooperation with the German bridge between the network conference this hatred come from? With his staging Theatre Technician Society (Deutsche re:publica and the Berlin Theatertreffen Borderline Procession, the director and Theatertechnische Gesellschaft, DTHG), and takes place every year in May between artistic director of the Kay Voges Theatre the Dortmund Theatre wants to make the two industry meetings of the network developed a theatre evening that deals with artists and theatre technicians fit for and the theatre scene in Berlin. the constantly firing media and excessive theatre in the digital age.
Borderline Prozession, Director: Kay Voges/ Theater Dortmund (photo © Birgit Hupfeld)
CONCLUSION The scene in Germany is a scene in between the virtual and physical world. theatres in Germany still represents a upheaval. The performing arts today The borders between the sectors and strong structural umbrella for the overall works to mediate between the most between institutional and independent architecture of the theatre landscape, diverse intersections: at the crossing of forms of production are becoming fluid, which needs to be defended. That is why private and public spaces, at the border as are the borders between countries independent and institutionalised theatre between fiction and documentation, and cultures. However, the dense should not be played off against each between pop and high culture, and network of the city, state, and national other.
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