HowlRound: In the summer of 2015, Frank Castorf, the longtime director of the Volksbühne Berlin—the most important drama house in Germany—was fired. Chris Dercon, from the Tate Modern, will take over the Volksbühne in 2017. Nationally, a great controversy began between those who want to hold on to Castorf's theatre and others who say that a change is necessary. They want to open the theatre to international artists and new trends in drama, dance, and performance. Unlike in the US, publicly financed theatres in Germany are battlefields of harsh debates in the media, while the number of spectators tends to decrease almost unnoticed year by year.
2 comments:
Germany's passion for theater ad the arts has always intrigued and interested me. In the times I have visited Germany it almost impossible to go any where into the country and not see a theater of any kind, and after reading in the article that Germany's budget for the arts is 2.6 billion I was astonished, we as acountry (that is just under 4 times their population) are only willing to 150 million for the sponsorship of the arts, or aleast we were. While I can recognize the German government's wish to make some budget cuts I believe that it is Germany's arts culture that defines its people. That being said the fact that the vast majority of theaters in Germany work in rep style is both impressive on one hand due to the shear volume of shows produced, but on the other hand not cost effective and not easy to maintain in the long run due to the high cost of labor needed to pull it off. And it is here that I think you would be able to address the lack of marginal returns per show if you were to move several of the national theaters away from the rep model and try to add some balance to the theatrical style in Germany. That all being said I hope Germany manages to keep it vibrant theatrical culture moving forward, because I have always wanted to work within it at some point in my career. Bis später.
When people think of major theater works Germany usually isn't one of the first thoughts that pops in ones head but i think that this article points out the wonderful state of theater being created over there. Calling back to history is important and the culture of political commentary in theater i think brings a deep connection between the theater and the German people. In that sense i think it is easy to have independent theaters because to the culture of theater there. this also helps build the theatrical landscape mentioned in the article as equal among the theaters and i think thats true. i think that it allows the art to flourish in really wonderful and unexpected ways. I hope to see more theater coming out of Germany in a national way. so that it can become more popular as an international theatrical hub. That Way it can really shine and hopefully influence other theater cultures.
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