The Grüner Salon was programmed by Calla Henkel and Max Pitegoff during the Volksbühne’s 2017/18 season.
11 November 2017
Opening
The Grüner Salon reopens with a soundtrack
on loop developed for the space by the
composer Katrin Vellrath and longtime
Volksbühne ensemble member and musician
Sir Henry, setting the tone for the first theater
piece and the 2017/18 Spielzeit as a whole. The
set will already be arranged for the premiere of News Crime Sports, which begins its run the
following weekend.
17, 18, 23, 24, 25 November; 7, 8, 9 December 2017 News Crime Sports
by Calla Henkel & Max Pitegoff
with Agathe Bommier, Mia von Matt, Lily McMenamy,
Leon Kahane, Theresa Patzschke, Elias Pitegoff, Sir
Henry & the voice of Silvia Rieger
Musical composition: Sir Henry & Katrin Vellrath
Costumes: Ella Plevin
Choreography: Tarren Johnson
Madness falls in waves as the passengers of
a cruise ship stuck at sea fill the hours, weeks,
and years that seem to unfold at once, passing
Rimbaud poems like herpes, while regurgitating
the regressive fantasies of a lost social order.
1 & 2 December 2017 abonnement lyrique: - hector berliozzz - Michael Kleine with Vera Maria Kremers
& Roman Lemberg
abonnement lyrique: - hector berliozzz - is a
classical concert in the Grüner Salon staged
and organized by Michael Kleine. The program
begins with the classic duo set-up, featuring
dramatic soprano Vera Maria Kremers
and Roman Lemberg on the piano, and it
focuses on the work of Hector Berlioz, as a
representative of the extreme Romanticism of
19th-century France.
14 & 15 December 2017 Ominous Reality Principle
Neda Sanai with Jen Rosenblit
& Hengameh Yaghoobifarah
Ominous Reality Principle encompasses
several performative scenarios where sound,
text and bodies come together to reflect on the
politics of defense mechanisms, the psychology
of sound and the threat of language. The
material encompasses a score composed
by Neda Sanai, performer Jen Rosenblit’s
current research, which focuses on strategies
and problems of togetherness, and writer
Hengameh Yaghoobifarah spatializing writing
and pushing journalism into a dystopian reallife
scenario. These three separate practices
merge together and spread into the Grüner
Salon like an aroma diffuser.
19 January 2018 Concert: Trevor Lee Larson
Trevor Lee Larson plays to the room.
27 January 2018 Concert: Lyra / Bendik Giske
In this intimate concert, saxophonist Bendik
Giske and singer Lyra Pramuk explore the raw
expressive potential of their own voices as
instruments, their instruments as voices. The
evening blends solo material with collaborative
play, with works both acoustic and electronic,
in a reverberating arc of experimental song and
storytelling.
8, 9, 10, 22, 23, 24 February; 1, 2, 3 March 2018 Health & Safety
by Calla Henkel & Max Pitegoff
with Jochen Arbeit, Leon Kahane, Lily McMenamy,
Sir Henry, Tobias Spichtig & Mia von Matt
Musical composition: Jochen Arbeit and Sir Henry
Costumes: Nhu Duong
Choreography: Tarren Johnson
All the good things happen in private now.
These unconscious buildings. One character
pours bags of sugar into droning concrete
mixers, another falls in love with Potsdamer
Platz out of pity. Bored by the monotony of
contemporary Berlin, the ghost of Karl Friedrich
Schinkel staggers drunk from construction site
to bar, unable to lift a brick. Loosely shadowing
Molière’s The Misanthrope, Health & Safety is
about architecture and heartbreak, destruction
and disease, and the collapse of theory into
practice. “The next war on a new structure.”
8 & 9 March 2018 Esponja
Yusuf Etiman with Alessandro Ubirajara Olbrich,
Cibelle Cavalli Bastos, Cobi van Tonder, J
ane D, Juliane Elting, Luís Knihs, Nico Arawá,
Philip Wiegard, Sabina Maria van der Linden
& Tatiana Saphir
Esponja is a collective and space-in-the-making
from São Paulo aiming to create,
support and unite artistic and political initiatives/
movements/efforts to reflect a new collective
momentum in a time of extreme polarization
and fractionalization of societies, in Brazil and
elsewhere. It was initiated by a group around
Yusuf Etiman, who lives and works between
São Paulo and Berlin, where he founded the
magazine and project space basso (2005–
2011).
16 March 2018 People Mover
with films by Marte Eknæs/Michael Amstad, John
Smith, & Charles Atlas/Karole Armitage
DJ set by Polido
Berlin-based artist Marte Eknæs and filmmaker/animator Michael Amstad present their short
film People Mover, 2017, which follows a loose
narrative set in an imaginary city to reflect on
ideas of flexibility and urbanism. Focusing
on the construction and usage of the urban
sphere, the film asks how we form and in turn
are affected by commercial and sometimes
alienating systems and surroundings. The
program also consists of two short films related
to People Mover: John Smith’s Blight, 1994–96,
and Charles Atlas/Karole Armitage’s From An
Island Summer, 1983–84. The film program will
be interspersed with a live set by the Berlin and
Portugal-based musician Polido, who worked
on the sound design for People Mover.
23 March 2018 Nocturnal Kinship
Sandra Mijunga with Alea Kristal Alexis, Christèle
Baonga-Alunga & Cassianne Lawrence
DJ set by Kikelomo
Berlin-based artist and musician Sandra
Mujinga constructs worlds and identities
through performances incorporating her own
music, costume and video elements. Her work
examines the contradictions in representational
politics and visibility, taking into account ideas
of surveillance and survival, care and selfpreservation.
In the Grüner Salon, Mujinga
will present a new piece with three performers
accompanied by a live musical set.
29 March 2018 Concert: Möbelkammer
with Eike Grögel, Anke Marschall, Fee Aviv
Marschall, Antje Schulz, Yvonne Schulz, Sir Henry &
Jan Wüstenberg
In the depths of the Volksbühne, between
pianos, benches, lecterns, chairs, tables and
sofas there has always has been and will
always be music. Sometimes it’s out of key, but
that’s not the point. Finding joy and pleasure
in making music among coworkers has a long
tradition here. There have been many evenings,
many songs, many people, arguments,
love, happiness, tears. Making music brings
people together. Our non-professional band,
playing with feeling under the beating pulse
of the wheel that has not stopped turning.
Möbelkammer is Volksbühne’s house band,
named after its furniture storage room – a place
where a lot of stuff is stowed away, some of
it as old as the hills but some of it brand new.
This is their first standalone public concert.
30 March 2019 #PLZ, RESCHYKLI$CCH
Karl Holmqvist with Eric D. Clark
Karl Holmqvist reads #PLZ, RESCHYKLI$CCH,
with a DJ set before and/or after by Eric D. Clark.
5, 6, 7, 12, 13, 14 April 2018 Concorde: Saturn Returns
A play by Georgia Gardner Gray and Steven Warwick
Directed by Georgia Gardner Gray
With Michele DiMenna, Joseph Geagan, Georgia
Gardner Gray, Calla Henkel, Tara Khan, Max Pitegoff,
Britta Thie & Steven Warwick
Artist Georgia Gardner Gray and artist &
musician Steven Warwick present a play on
celebrity and jetset culture in the long twentieth
century, set on the Concorde. Flight’s boarding.
A voyage of discovery of sorts. A funny mix of
people on board. A bit like a wedding: some
old people, some new people, some artists I’d
rather avoid. Really, are they playing “Candle in
the Wind”? A bit sinister before take off, innit?
20 April 2018 Begone Dull Care
Sir Henry with Theresa Patzschke
Sir Henry, a longtime member of the
Volksbühne ensemble, is known for his work
as a musical director. He has been the musical
anchor for the Grüner Salon this season.
On this special evening, inspired by Norman
McLaren and Evelyn Lambart’s same-titled
seminal work of 1949, his explorations in
automatic music and coding take him to
the realms of interactive installation. The
movements of guests in the room activate
various virtual instruments as their gestures
transform into melodies that harmonically
blend with a central midi-driven playlist, while
triggering and manipulating visuals with spring
and Eleusinian themes. As performative focal
points during the evening, Theresa Patzschke
and Sir Henry will join forces in a lovely duet for
flute and mapping projection.
8 May 2018 Reading by Silvia Rieger: Auschwitz Chronicle 1939-1945 by Danuta Czech
Screening: Night and Fog by Alain Resnais, 1956
On 8 May – known in many countries as
the “Day of Liberation,” commemorating the
unconditional surrender of the Wehrmacht
and thus the end of World War II – Silvia
Rieger reads (in German) from Danuta
Czech’s Auschwitz Chronicle 1939–1945: a
daily chronicle of events in the concentration
camp compiled from innumerable documents.
In addition there will be a screening of Alain
Resnais’ 1955 documentary Night and Fog.
18 May 2018 HQ: (I Feel So Mezzaniney)
Steven Warwick and Carlos María Romero
with Laura Sorribes & Indward de Jesus
HQ: (I feel so Mezzaniney) is a collaboration
by artist & musician Steven Warwick and
dancer/choreographer Carlos María Romero,
developed at the FUGA residency in Zaragoza
earlier this year. This performance for three
dancers and one musician is the latest mutation
of Warwick’s “Mezzanine” performance series,
each of which responds to the architecture
in which it is performed, in conjunction here
and previously with Romero’s choreographic
practice. Dancers (Las Mezzaninas) are
maids-in-waiting, performing labour and
acting out the conflicts found in and on
platform capitalism, where self-care routines
and community-building are monetised and
gaslighting fragments trust.
26, 27, 28 April; 12, 25, 26 May 2018 Today Is Tomorrow
by Calla Henkel & Max Pitegoff
with Preston Chaunsumlit, Ann Göbel, Lily
McMenamy & Mia von Matt
video cameos by Askar Brickman, Natascha
Goldenberg & Sabina Maria van der Linden
Musical composition: Sir Henry & Katrin Vellrath
Choreography: Tarren Johnson
Today Is Tomorrow follows a TV news
channel and its anchors as they navigate the
contested truths of this loud and absurd planet.
Empathy is a fallen empire. RIP. No one could
handle their nightly strolls bombarded by
neighbourhood goldfinches screaming about
pesticides and their demented children born
from tissue-paper-thin eggs... I understand the
jumpers and sleeping-pill swallowers. It was too
much to listen to the family dog rattle on about
his heartbreak from his balls being chopped
off, his yearnings for a family of his own, his
insecurities with his weight... more emotional
labour to process... Oh yes, I understand Joan
of Arc’s last words to the judge: Light your fires.
2 June 2018 Jochen Arbeit with Schneider TM and Claas
Grosszeit: 12 String Ragas
Theresa Patzschke: Verweile Doch
Jochen Arbeit, who collaborated on Health &
Safety in the Grüner Salon this past spring,
is a Berlin-based musician who long played
with the Einstürzende Neubauten, AUTOMAT
and Die Haut. In this improvisational set, his
and Schneider TM’s 12 string guitar–based
loops are joined by the percussion of Claas
Grosszeit. The evening begins with a reading
(in German) by Theresa Patzschke, a writer
and musician from Berlin. “Spread your wings
For Death / Let the stars rain down upon
you Until they inflame you.” Linger Awhile –
Verweile Doch.
8 June 2018 One Night Only: two flies in the house of life
Mia von Matt & Seykou Younge with Sara Mathiasson
Performative sketches on the reflective
subconsciousness of a cunt mom and a stray
cat who wake up in front of a live audience.
A Zero Zone of boundless expectations
A recipe for killing the feeling
Voices and Revoices and Recorded Voices
featuring: the Incestuous Sisters aka the
Cunnilinguist Queens, the son of a mother who
plays saxophone, and a Souffleuse
16 June 2018 2061 INMORAL LIDOS
(After the launch of the 5th
generation of Dark Pools in El Segundo, serious
decay happens in the fissures of the leftover
population)
Discoteca Flaming Star with Benedicte Clementsen,
Frans Jacobi, Robert M. Ochshorn & Dagmar Gabler
Over the course of a three year-long
preoccupation with Dark Pools – a form of
secret, anonymous algorithmic stock trading
with an increasing impact on global economics
– Benedicte Clementsen, Frans Jacobi, and
Discoteca Flaming Star have produced a
collection of texts responding to these parallel
structures and the enigmatic shadows they
cast onto their surroundings: our surroundings.
Based on the “semantic fields” generated in
interviews with experts, the stories explored
in 2061 INMORAL LIDOS refract the opaque
surfaces of Dark Pools and the twisted
fantasies beneath to shape an ambivalent
territory that is part fiction, part wild research.
1 July 2018 Glamor and Danger in Warwarwar: The Salon
The Gray Voice Ensemble (Elisabeth Wood with
Alex Michalak, Anne-Cécile Desjardin, Anne-Sophie
Debrabant, Cristina Druga, Elisabeth Haentjes,
Elisabeth Wood, Esra Altin, J.R. Blank, Judith
Lavagna, Kathrin Schömer, Laura Brophy, Leonie
Nagel, Lingji Hon, Mario Campos Castellano, Marlene
Denningmann, Matthias Hoffmann, Melissa Daher,
Michael Silverberg, Nori Niki Nori, Ori Behr & Paul
Aràmbula)
The Gray Voice Ensemble sings the songs of
Albert McCloud and is an ongoing experiment
in community, founded in 2013 and directed by
Elisabeth Wood.
28, 29, 30 June; 4, 5, 6, 7, July 2018 Der Klang der Familie by Calla Henkel & Max Pitegoff
with Johannes Buchmann, Ann Göbel, Calla Henkel,
Herman Hermann, Lily McMenamy, Elias Pitegoff,
Max Pitegoff, Sir Henry, Tobias Spichtig & Mia von
Matt
Musical composition: Sir Henry
Stage & costume design: Calla Henkel, Nadja Sofie Eller & Max Pitegoff
Choreography: Tarren Johnson
In the last of the series of plays by Calla Henkel
and Max Pitegoff for the Grüner Salon, a family
band unpacks their gear for a gig in a Chinese
restaurant in Berlin on Christmas Day. Straight
marriage is illegal. Global warming has finally
grown up. The smell of Syrian wheat and frozen
assets wafts over Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz like
cheap suntan lotion. The crypto-plague is
behind us, so we’ve straightened the hems of
our peasant dresses: it’s time to get back to
what we do as a civilization. “Today I am your
mother, tomorrow I’ll be your brother, but we’re
stuck playing this goddamn hit song till the day
we die.”