WOLFGANG
A piece for a speaker, a conductor, a musician and trucker, a choir, five to six dancers and a child. As wolves, they dance in a Europe, from which they were expelled for a long time. Territorialisation, whether cartographic, biologically evolutionary or just in the mind, is an incisive process. backsteinhaus produktion gets on the ball and follows it to the limit of its own possibilities.
If man fell to his hands, walked as a quadruped, let his fur grow and howled, evolution would have taken a significant step. How much better would the wild one, the angry one, the discarded one, the humiliated one, and the offended one be? No hate speech, no hands free for weapons or possessions to grab. He would have a mouth that salivates, not to eat his neighbour, but to supply them with choked back food. So he would finally no longer be a threat and become completely innocent, moving freely across all boundaries pure of heart.
Howling, the wolves drag down the barriers of our thinking, tear at the image of the stranger, the intruder, the frightener and show us how peaceful social interaction can be lived harmlessly and safely.
Duration of the piece: ca. 90 minutes
Premiere: October 12th 2017 // Theater Rampe, Stuttgart
Premiere new staging: October 18th 2018 // Seoul International Dance Festival, Korea
More shows:
15. –19. Sep 2020 // STOFF – Stockholm Fringe Festival, Sweden
21. – 27. Sep 2020 // Istanbul Fringe Festival, Turkey
WOLFGANG was selected for the Tanz Jahrbuch 2018 as one of the seven best pieces about homeland.
Dates
Contributors
Performers: Chloé Beillevaire, Steven Chotard, Caroline Intrup, Martin Mauriès, Jean Bermes, Andreia Rodrigues, Samuel Liszta
Repetitors: Ariadna Girones Mata, Lorenzo Ponteprimo
Concept and choreography: Nicki Liszta
Music: Heiko Giering
Stage & costume: Valentin Eisele
Video: Christopher Bühler
Technical support: Joscha Eckert
Dramaturgy: Martina Grohmann
Audio description design and realisation: Peter Luttringer, Valentin Leuschel
Press
Press:
»… because the choreographer Nicki Liszta rules this carnivore, the spectators can expect an unusual dance theater evening, in which constellations are broken and rules are turned upside down – so intensively that it quickly becomes clear: the wolf is about the wall in our heads, the ability to be awake and changeable rather than lethargic and biased.
Liszta is a master at communicating themes through spatial proximity … cared for by a ›personal performer‹, no one has to be afraid when he finds himself suddenly under wolves. … the dance [maintains] animal sharpness and explores the balance between human gait and wolf gait with aggressive force until evolutionary leaps become painful locomotion. …
Not how we want to live is the question, but how we can live together: Nicki Liszta finds beastly good pictures for the tensions of the time.« Andrea Kachelrieß, Stuttgarter Nachrichten, 14. October 2017
»Don’t feel too cozy: Just sitting and watching is not enough for Nicki Liszta. In the dance-theatrical undertakings of the Stuttgart choreographer you never know exactly what to expect as a spectator. Also ›Wolfgang‹ at the Theater Rampe makes you jump sometimes. …
Despite all doubts sometimes the hope, that we all still have the savage within us, almost rises. In addition to the great ensemble giving everything, Heiko Giering’s live music is an essential part of the exciting evening.« Angela Reinhardt, Eßlinger Zeitung, 14./15. October 2017
»Wolves are lurking on the audience tribune. We would love them if they were just dogs. But wolves wander and don’t respect borders. We only know them from afar. That’s our fear. Now we’re even supposed to take them in: ›Crossbreed wolves, a little bit of Arctic Wolf, a little bit Arabian,‹ praises the voice. The wolf pack pounces on us – dancers as wolves as refugees, ›on whom we use firearms if necessary.‹ There is a shot. In the leg. There is singing.
We love our homeland, the folkloric evenings. Not the traditional ones, but the folkloric evenings, which unite us against the construction of the highway. Or against refugees. In a non-contact duo, neither dancer allows a step to pass the other. This free Stuttgart production of Nicki Liszta shows neither refugees nor wolves, but points to us, the audience. I believe: Our fear is our home.« Arnd Wesemann, Tanz Jahrbuch 2018
Partner
Realised in cooperation with the Theater Rampe in the line of the three-year collaboration ›Rampe tanzt!‹. Funded through conceptions-subsidies of the Landesverband Freie Tanz- und Theaterschaffende Baden-Württemberg e.V. aus Mitteln des Ministeriums für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kunst des Landes Baden-Württemberg and the City of Stuttgart and kindly supported by Stiftung der Landesbank Baden-Württemberg.
The guest performance at the Seoul International Dance Festival was made possible by the kind support of the Goethe Institute and the City of Stuttgart.
