As of: April 8th, 2021 4:13 p.m.
The Deutsches Schauspielhaus, the Thalia Theater and the Ensemble Resonanz have joined forces with a video project to make the De Chirico exhibition in the Kunsthalle, which is closed for the time being, accessible to a wider audience.
The two theaters and the ensemble try to approach de Chirico’s works in their own way. Based on one of the main works in the exhibition, “The Child’s Brain”, the project is entitled “In the Child’s Brain”. Seven videos will be bundled by mid-April presented on the website of the Hamburger Kunsthalle.
Cross-border way of thinking in de Chirico and Savinio
“Who is de Chirico? What happens to the visitor who goes to the exhibition? What is detached? What happens in the art gallery when there are no visitors?” – These are the questions that Schauspielhaus director Max Pross is investigating with some colleagues on the project. In keeping with the metaphysical art that the painter developed together with his brother, the composer Alberto Savinio. It stands for a cross-border way of thinking – but also a cross-genre expression in painting, poetry and music.
However, the cooperation project is not a theoretical or art-historical approach to the works. “De Chirico said of himself that he was a dreamer. When asked what he was dreaming, he replied: ‘I can’t tell you. Dreams are far too vague for me to tell you'”, tells Pross. “In a certain way, the videos also stay in an area that is not realistic, but rather depicts a fantasy world – either of the artist or the visitor.”
Nietzsche’s influence on de Chirico
Another video is about the influence that Nietzsche had on the painter. Actress Ute Hannig’s role as a bored museum supervisor seems to blur the lines between reality and reality. Suddenly she walks down the impressive marble staircase of the art gallery in an elegant red gala dress.
Nietzsche himself characterized his thought of the eternal return as one of his most difficult and deepest, explains Pross: “Of course I want to make a contribution to the fact that the institutions stay alive. That one remembers what it is like when I stand facing these images . What do they do to me? “
Hamburg’s cultural institutions are moving closer together during the crisis
Just like in de Chirico’s painting, there are also superimposed spaces in the videos. Performers from the Thalia Theater walk through the exhibition on the forecourt of the Kunsthalle, then they are back on the empty stage in the Thalia Theater. The Ensemble Resonanz brings de Chirico’s art together with strange places like the Millerntorstadion, interweaving it with music by Anton Webern and Cassandra Miller.
A nice side effect: The Hamburg cultural institutions are moving closer together during the crisis. The Schauspielhaus dramaturge Ralf Fiedler also observes: “The fact that you otherwise never work directly together and now actually do it, which is associated with many conversations and zoom meetings, you also get to know each other – beyond the artistic debate Moving together and a very honest solidarity with one another.
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