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TEXT Sebastian Arnstorf FOTO / MONTAGE Maxwel
Berlin is the city of creativity. Exciting architecture is being created
in Berlin. Berlin is turning into an international home of art
and galleries. But Berlin is also a living centre for theatre. It is
from here in 2007 that theatre will start its advance on the endless
reaches of virtual worlds.
The newly founded Berliner Logentheater ® invites the public
to enjoy digital theatre. The visitor to www.logentheater.de is
whisked off to a stage with his first mouse click; in viewing, experience
and action merge. Using just one finger, the public can
click its way through interactive productions from both great authors
and unknown slam poets. Works by Peter Weiss, Wolfgang
Deichsel and the South African dramatist Athol Fugard have already
been produced and reside on the internet, where they can
be called up and experienced at any time.
The backdrop against which the theatre boxes were digitally built
is part of ORCO’s visionary Fehrbelliner Project. The Berlin Logentheater’s
digital setting comes thanks to the real estate firm’s
claim to stage urban spaces and, at the same time, support Berlin’s
unique creative potential. Behind the old façades of the Fehrbelliner
courtyards classical theatre, music and action art are being
given a new global stage in a world-encompassing digital spider’s
web. Berlin actors, musicians, web designers, directors, poets and
video artists are digitising theatre literature and thus creating a
completely new form of entertainment in the digital age.
The Logentheater is testing out new possibilities using new types
of web design. The designers, Maxwel & Shezad, for example,
have created a symmetrical system behind the façade, in which
every window (theatre box) represents the entrance to a particular
level, in which 12 further boxes can be played. Film scenes are part
of the production, whereby the visitor first has to grasp the fact
that he can click into the scenes and thus create new ones. Imagine
the possibilities!
The Maxwel designers have set new standards with this web design.
The Berlin agency for multimedial communication has transformed
the idea of virtual theatre into an interactive motion picture
– a world of moving pictures and sound. Experts are thrilled.
»Great visuals, impressive sound, good navigation, very intuitive
feel« are just a few of the comments heard after the first test.
»We are the Berliner Logentheater, music is our mother and the
word our father; we take the themes which TV has spared you«,
sings Araba Walton in one of the boxes in the Slam Poetry wing.
The famous jazz musician Jean Paul Bourelly accompanies her
on guitar. He also wrote the music for another piece in the programme,
»Blood Knot« written by the South African dramatist
Athol Fugard, for which the film maker Branwen Okpako directed
in a theatre for the first time. »In Heilbronn, we re-opened
the »Alte Theater Sontheim« with Blood Knot – after two weeks
of rehearsals on site – it was fantastic …« says actor Johannes
Brandrup speaking of one of the Logentheater’s first real performances,
»…the press was thrilled«.
Other pieces in the current programme include »Night with
Guests» by Peter Weiss, which has been produced as a radioclick-film.
»To be continued when the financing is available«, says
Wigbert Böll. »We are still only at the start«. But the Berliner
Logentheater is not only available in the virtual world. »The idea
and our concept is a completely new linking of real, experienceable
performing arts – in other words, theatre, music, poetry,
etc. – and digital processing, whereby the virtual part may appear
first«, explains managing Director Wigbert Böll.
While the Berliner Logentheater has already found a digital home,
there are still no fixed real theatres. »But we are also interested in
direct contact with the public«, says Johannes Brandrup. »We are
currently on the search for the right theatre for a weekly show,
where one can see many of the artists who appear on the internet,
performing live«.
The internet frees the artists from the constraints of traditional
production conditions but until direct feedback from the public
is possible, the artists of the Logentheater are concentrating on
normal appearances.
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