Serapion theater

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Ulrike Kaufmann and Erwin Piplits (with Karl Markovics and Peter Simonischek ) at Nestroy 2010 , where she received an award for her life's work

The Serapionstheater is an Austrian theater group that was founded in 1973 by Ulrike Kaufmann and Erwin Piplits .

history

The Odeon , the theater's location since 1988 (2012)
In the Odeon (2010)

At the time it was founded, the theater group was called “Pupodrom”, and from 1978 onwards, today's Vindobona , a former cinema, was used for eleven years. In 1980 the name was changed to "Serapionstheater" and in 1988 the company moved to the current venue, the "Odeon Theater" in the former stock exchange for agricultural products , which was built by Karl König from 1887 to 1890 . The Serapions Ensemble adapted the large stock exchange hall with its own resources until June 1988 while preserving the listed building as an event location and named it "Odeon". Gradually, company and foyer rooms were also rented. It took eight years for the adaptation of the Odeon to be fully funded. The public sector was only involved with 16%.

This company owes its name to the serapiontic principle that ETA Hoffmann developed in order to be able to merge extremely opposing elements into one unit. The artistic implementation of thoughts and ideas is about the transformation of the inside into the outside, the transfer of the spiritual into the real and the transformation of the soul into the physical, artistic; an animation of matter. The artist will therefore, in the sense of the Serapiontic principle, in humility (humility = courage to serve) take an attitude against egoism, opportunism, insincerity, stupidity, brutality, petty-bourgeois behavior in all varieties, under whatever mask. Through his work he will counteract all patronizing, ideologizing and dogma.

The name Serapion comes on the one hand from the mysticism of the three Abrahamic religions. The seraphim belong next to the thrones and the cherubims to the highest hierarchy of angels and are understood as fiery snakes. Seraph = snake. On the other hand, the name Serapion is derived from Egyptian and is the more precise version of the term "Osiris Apis". Osiris the bull. In this case the lying bull from which the grain grows, a god of vegetation and fertility . The Serapeion was a grain sanctuary in Memphis (Egypt) and there was a Serapeion in almost every Greek Temenos (temple district). With Serapis, Ptolemy I created a Greek-Egyptian mediator deity that spread throughout the Mediterranean. In Christian legends, Serapion appears as a hermit who is banished to the desert by Diocletian because he did not want to renounce his truth. As an anchor , he found his home in European literature (Balzac, Hoffmann, Lunz).

The emblem of the Serapions Ensemble refers to the working philosophy of the Serapions Theater: The way in which life and work are organized also results in a relatively hermetic closure of the Serapions Theater. It does not mix with the rest of the theater scene and does not follow trends, but rather gradually grows in the belly of a hall in the basement . A symbol chosen as a trademark expresses this state. The dragon Ouroboros devouring itself, dissolving good and evil and enclosing another image. A child sitting on a pot of gold. “Non nisi Parvules” is the motto for this emblem. Only for the little ones or the poor, at least for those who would not abuse this treasure

The Serapions Ensemble is made up of people from different countries and cultures, currently it consists of eleven members from Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, Austria, Portugal and South Korea.

In the production "School Of Night" the Serapionstheater used the following lines by Rainer Maria Rilke as the motto:

And we: spectators, always, everywhere,
towards everyone and never out!
We're overcrowded. We'll arrange it. It is falling apart.
We organize again and disintegrate ourselves.

Productions

The intention of the Serapionstheater is to combine music theater, dance, drama and visual arts, which is put into practice with long-term in-house productions.

  • Independent productions 1973–1977
“The Stradafüßler” (based on an episode from the Pinkafelder Chronicle by Joseph Michael Weinhofer ) / “The grass-green stone eater” (by Barbara Frischmuth ) / “Circus of Things” / “Karius und Baktus” / “The hoarse dragon” (by Benny Andersen ) / " Vineta " (by Jura Soyfer ) / "Nonsense, or the hat makes the man" (with poems by Ernst Jandl and others)
1978 “In his garden Perlimplim loves Belisa” (by Federico García Lorca ) / 1978 “The Metamorphoses of Herr Jakob” / 1979 “The Martyrdom of Piotr O'hey” (by Sławomir Mrożek ) / 1979 “Man And Arteffekt ” (with Dieter Kaufmann ) / 1979 “Bal Macabre” (in Meyrink ’s manner, including with Karl Ferdinand Kratzl ) / 1980 “The Gaulschreck im Rosennetz” (based on Fritz von Herzmanovsky-Orlando , with Helmut Qualtinger ) / 1980 “Bewunschen” (with André Heller ) / 1981 “Succubus - Tolldreiste Scenes” (with music by René Clemencic ) / 1982 “Double & Paradise” (including with Karl Markovics ) / 1983 “Heil'ge Hochzeit” (based on Richard Wagner's “ The Ring of the Nibelung ”) / 1984 "Patt" / 1986 "Anima" (performance location : Donau , am Dammhaufen) / 1986 "A Bao A Qu"
  • Odeon Theater
1988 "Axolotl Visionarr" / 1989 "Pan Hoffmann" / 1989 "Heil'ge Hochzeit" / 1990 "Kispotlatsch" / 1990 "Karacho" / 1991 "Nu" / 1992 "Come and see ... Guernica " (Remise, Wiener Festwochen) / 1992 "(Wi Monami)" / 1993 "I am hugging a shadow ..." (after Tankred Dorst ) / 1995 "17 + 4" / 1996 "Strange Unrest" ( Wiener Festwochen ) / 1997 "Lazarus" (Easter sound) / 1997 "Xanadu" / 1999 "Marie Magdeleine" (Osterklang) / 1999 "Marco Polo" ( Neue Oper Wien ) / 1999 "Nemo, Nemo Loqvitvr" / 2000 "Ni Más, Ni Menos" / 2001 "Nunaki" / 2002 "Ciao Mama "/ 2002" Persephone "(Osterklang) / 2004" Serapion, mon Amour "/ 2005" Xenos "/ 2007" Com Di Com Com "/ 2008" Alcione "(with Lorenz Duftschmid and Philipp Harnoncourt ) / 2009" Follow Me - Masque of Temperaments "(with Lorenz Duftschmid) / 2009" School Of Night "/ 2010" Engel Aus Feuer "(with Philipp Harnoncourt)

Art funding

In 2007, in an open letter to the politically responsible Elfriede Jelinek , Michael Haneke , André Heller , Paulus Manker , Gerhard Roth , Robert Schindel , Martin Kušej , Hilde Sochor , Ulrich Seidl , Peter Turrini , Olga Neuwirth u. a. the Serapion theater, which has had to fight for its existence for years due to a lack of subsidies:

We observe with concern that one of the most imaginative and original Viennese theaters, the Serapions Theater in the Odeon, is apparently in jeopardy. Erwin Piplits and Ulrike Kaufmann and their team developed new, attractive forms of theater with great independence and thus created something unmistakable in the Viennese theater scene - far beyond Austria's borders. With the Odeon, a venue was created on our own initiative and intensive development work, which is now arousing many desires from other institutions. Otherwise it does not seem to us to be explained that the Serapions Theater - on the one hand with ineffective promises, on the other hand with false information from the public - is being starved to death in an irresponsible delaying tactic when granting subsidies and establishing a foundation. It seems to us that dealing with deserving cultural workers in Vienna sometimes takes on threatening forms. We therefore ask you to prove the opposite, to take remedial action as soon as possible and to ensure the continued existence of the artistically valuable and distinguished Serapions Theater.

Erwin Piplits said of the quarrels and controversies about his theater and the attempt to exert political influence:

“We don't want to please anyone. It is not the job of art to please someone. This is other people's business. Those who get ahead quickly by walking slowly. ” (“ Die Presse ”,“ Spectrum ”, October 20, 2001) and with regard to the“ Vienna theater reform ”: “ Theater can only reform itself, although reform is not a really desirable process is. It would be more correct, and more important for the theater, more vital, would be a revolution against the intervention of managers, people from the academic world, from politics. A revolution in the sense that these people are thrown out of the theater, that would be necessary for the renewal and for the further liveliness of the theater. "

At the award ceremony of the Nestroy Prize in 2010, Paulus Manker , who was awarded the Audience Prize, said in his acceptance speech : “The strength in the theater comes from the fighters, from the 'chilli peppers', from the uncomfortable, from the monomaniac, from the continuously and criminally undersubsidized , the power in the theater comes from people like Erwin Piplits and Ulrike Kaufmann. "

Awards

Ulrike Kaufmann received the

literature

  • Erwin Piplits: Transformation and Reality. Böhlau Verlag, 1998.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Erwin Piplits: Transformation and Reality. Böhlau Verlag, 1998.
  2. ↑ Interview with Erwin Piplits
  3. ↑ http://www.isabella-feimer.net/files/diplomarbeit.pdf  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Interview with Erwin Piplits@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.isabella-feimer.net  
  4. ↑ http://www.alma-mahler.at/nestroy.html

Coordinates: 48 ° 12 ′ 51 ″  N , 16 ° 22 ′ 49 ″  E