Performing Monument

Performing Monument

Site-specific performance

The "Performing Denkmal" project questions Hamburg's relationship with its Jewish heritage through 12 monuments performed in public spaces and a final staging at the Lichthof Theater.

Video: Jonas Nellissen

About the project

Hamburg commemorates its Jewish community in numerous places. However, some of the memorials are in a questionable state, are defaced and often commemorate the lives that were extinguished by National Socialism. The impression is that Jewish life is still not safe. The memory of Jews is recorded in weathered and inaccessible memorial stones and plaques. Does Hamburg find it difficult to commemorate in itself or only in relation to its Jewish community? When does the desire to erect a memorial arise? Who or what should a memorial commemorate and what should it not? Where are the limits of the static, classical memorial? The art historian Julia Pelta Feldman writes that our monuments have "let us down".

Maria Isabel Hagen, Christopher Felix Hahn and team have been critically examining these monuments since 2020 and exploring performative possibilities of remembrance. In collaboration with Jewish representatives, they have created performative additions to existing monuments as well as new monuments to current Jewish life. The final performance asks how we want to remember and reflects on the process: implemented and rejected ideas, dicey situations and conversations, the hunt for permits and the tightrope walk in "dealing with Jewish heritage".

Pictures

Pictures: Dennis Mundkowski

Infos

Concept, Direction, Performance Maria Isabel Hagen
Concept, Performance Christopher-Felix Hahn
Performance Jessica Nupen
Performance Tempel Poolstraße Tanz: Yeva Lapsker, Malerei: Pavel Ehrlich
Video Utopische Denkmäler Pavel Franzusov
Dramaturgy Gunnar Seidel
Stage & Costumes Raphaela Andrade
Light Lars Kracht
Video Jonas Nellissen
Pictures Dennis Mundkowski
Production Julia Opitz
Netzworking Dominik Breuer
PR Julia Kulla

In Cooperation with Lichthof Theater Hamburg, Movement Metropolitan e.V., W3- Werkstatt für internationale Kultur und Politik

Fundings by the Fonds Darstellende Künste with funds from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media within the framework of NEUSTART KULTUR, the Hamburgische Kulturstiftung, the Landeszentrale für politische Bildung Hamburg, Bezirksamt Altona, Mara und Holger Cassens-Stiftung, Zusammen Leben und Arbeiten e.V., Inge-Deutschkron-Stiftung, Zeit Stiftung, Ursula Lachnit-Fixson Stiftung, Behörde für Kultur und Medien Hamburg (Rechercheförderung 2020)