Schritte verfolgen - Reconstruction 2007
Last season, Susanne Linke, one of the pioneers of German dance theatre, appeared at the Kaaitheater with Im Bade wannen, a dance solo from 1980. She danced it herself and thereby added a layer to the work: an aging body that recalls movements long past. This gave the performance an unusual beauty and fragility.
Linke conceived Schritte verfolgen in 1985, together with the choreographer and artist VA Wölfl. She considers it to be her artistic credo. In this autobiographical solo she returns to experiences from her childhood: as a result of illness, she only started learning to hear and speak at the age of six, so movements and gestures were her first means of expression. In this choreographic piece she marks out the small steps by which a personality is filled out. She reveals a part of her history, without revealing herself: the beauty and precision of the dance intensify and transcend the autobiographical component.
This second reconstruction, which Linke performs with three female dancers, is also given extra import: the process of aging, reaching maturity, and the joyful confirmation of the desire to ‘be’ at every stage of life.
reconstruction of the production Susanne Linke/VA Wölfel: Schritte verfolgen, solo
premiere: 18.9.1985, 35. Berliner Festwoche at the Akademie der Künste, Berlin
reconstruction Susanne Linke
dance Susanne Linke, Armelle H. van Eecloo, Mareike Franz, Elisabetta Rosso
set VA Wölfl
light design Johan Delaere
light Hartmut Litzinger
stage Roger Irman
stage realisation Norbert Krüger
music collage Dieter Behne
sound Damian Lang
music Hector Berlioz, “Faust Verdammnis”: Romanze des Gretchen / Ritt über den Abgrund; Eisenbahngeräusche; Trommelmusik aus Rwanda und Togo; Frédéric Chopin, Walzer op.64/3, gespielt von Sergei Rachmaninoff, 1923; Frédéric Chopin, Nocture op.9/2, gespielt von Sergei Rachmaninoff, 1923; Ginger Baker, Toad; Edward Grieg, Huldigungsmarsch; Gustav Mahler, 9. Sinfonie, Schluss des 4. Satzes
production The.Lab art & media (D)
co-production PACT Zollverein (D), Théâtre Le Phénix (F)
in association with Europalia, Goethe Institut Brüssel, Federal Foreign Office
