Ring-tailed lemur Sterna

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Ring-tailed lemur star, around 1918

Katta Sterna (born December 19, 1897 in Berlin ; † July 29, 1984 ), born Katharina Stern , was a German actress and dancer .

family

Katharina Stern was the daughter of the engineer Georg Joseph Stern and his wife Bertha Elisabeth (1870–1963), née Schmidt. This was the younger sister of Conrad Schmidt and Käthe Kollwitz , née Schmidt. Katharina's sisters were the actress Johanna Therese , married to director Fritz Kortner ), the actress and choreographer Maria and the theater actress Gregola (stage name Regula Keller, 1897–1983).

During her puberty, Katharina was considered unfocused and very impulsive. Her parents therefore consulted the professor Theodor Draw of the Charité Psychiatric and Nervous Clinic at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Berlin , who diagnosed her as incurable and recommended her placement in a sanatorium.

Professional development

Katta Stern and Ernst Mátray , ca.1925
Ernst Mátray and Katta Stern, ca.1929

When Katharina saw the dancer Anna Pavlova dancing, she decided to become a dancer too. She received lessons from the Austrian dancer, choreographer, dance teacher and actress Grete Wiesenthal . She received her first engagements at the German Opera House in Berlin, where she took the stage name "Katta Sterna". In 1913 she met the actor and dancer Ernst Mátray , who was married to the actress Greta Schröder . Both became a couple both professionally and personally.

In 1915 Katta Sterna made her debut as a theater actress with Max Reinhardt at the side of Ernst Mátray in Midsummer Night's Dream . From this point on, many more joint appearances as a dance duo followed. She also performed as a solo dancer in the Mátray Ballet . In contemporary literature, her dance style was described as a new type of pantomime , it was “built entirely on mimo-dramatic gestures. As much as spiritual influence can be felt, it is also closely interwoven with the rhythm. Above all, you feel the joy of movement; Pleasure to let off steam with the spiritually permeated, but no longer spiritually directed feeling ”.

From 1914 she played in silent films, initially for Lumpchens Glück . Her only sound film in 1930 was Tingel-Tangel, produced by Erich Engels . The Zehlendorf poet Otto Braun fell in love with her around 1917 .

In addition to the film business, Katta Sterna became an innovative dancer. In the 1920s, projects emerged together with Ernst Mátray and her sister Maria Solveg, a. a. The green flute , in front of the mirror and a midsummer night's dream .

“Reinhardt's dance pantomime The Green Flute seemed to want to make an epoch not only in the history of stage dance, but also in all of scenic art. The black and gold symphony in velvet and bronze, this flaming, colorful, rococo Chinese fairy tale unleashed storms of enthusiasm. […] Individual dance performances linger in the memory: Katta Sterna, who after all has the rare ability to give hollow forms of ballet personal expressiveness, Ernst Matray, strong in the grotesque, and, as a picture, the beautiful young Norwegian Lillebil Christensen, who is with the resumption of pantomime was replaced by Katta Sterna's unfinished sister Maria Solveg. "

- John Schikowski

After the transfer of power to the National Socialists , the artist, categorized as a fully Jewish woman, was no longer allowed to perform in the German Reich. She toured England and the United States, but the attempt to emigrate failed. She therefore had to withdraw from public life in Germany.

Your estate is kept in the German Dance Archive in Cologne.

Filmography

  • 1914: Lumpchen's luck
  • 1914: The sports girl
  • 1915: The Bartered Bride
  • 1915: marionettes
  • 1915: little devil
  • 1918: Ticky-Tacky
  • 1919: a brilliant case
  • 1919: The engagement telescope
  • 1920: Flicker Hearts
  • 1920: O you pinch of my heart
  • 1921: comrades
  • 1921: When I was a corpse
  • 1929: Sailors dance. Maria Solveg and Katta Sterna from the Matray Ballet
  • 1930: Tingel-Tangel

literature

  • Paul Nikolaus , Ernst E. Stern : dancers . Delphin-Verlag, Munich 1919, p. 43. OCLC 853284221
  • John Schikowski : History of Dance . Book Guild Gutenberg, Berlin 1926, p. 159. OCLC 914634787
  • Victor Junk : Manual of Dance . Ernst Klett Verlag, Stuttgart 1930, p. 225.
  • Burcu Dogramaci: Three Sisters. The actresses Maria Solveg, Katta Sterna and Johanna Hofer between empire and emigration . In: Exil , No. 1 (2003), pp. 62-77. (Part 1); Exil , No. 2 (2003), 2, pp. 5-19. (Part 2)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Katta Sterna biography . In: IMDb, on: imdb.com
  2. ↑ a b c d e Burcu Dogramaci: Three sisters. The actresses Maria Solveg, Katta Sterna and Johanna Hofer between empire and emigration . In: Exil , No. 1 (2003), pp. 62-77. (Part 1); Exil , No. 2 (2003), 2, pp. 5-19. (Part 2)
  3. ^ Paul Nikolaus , Ernst E. Stern : Dancers . Delphin-Verlag, Munich 1919, p. 43. OCLC 853284221
  4. ↑ Tingel-Tangel . In: filmportal.de, on: filmportal.de
  5. ↑ John Schikowski: History of Dance . Book Guild Gutenberg, Berlin 1926, p. 159. OCLC 914634787
  6. ↑ Ring- tailed lemur Sterna . In: German Dance Archive Cologne, on: deutsches-tanzarchiv.de
  7. ↑ Ring- tailed lemur Sterna . In: filmportal.de, on: filmportal.de
personal data
SURNAME Sterna, ring-tailed lemur
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Stern, Katharina (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German actress and dancer
DATE OF BIRTH December 19, 1897
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH July 29, 1984
Place of death Berlin