100 Jahre Bauhaus at Akademie der Künste / Berlin, Germany


100 Jahre Bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival

A colourful explosion of the arts in Berlin to kick off the Bauhaus anniversary in 2019

16 – 24 January 2019

Akademie der Künste
Hanseatenweg 10
10557 Berlin


Das Triadische Ballett, Bayerisches Junior Ballett München, photo: Wilfried Hösl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, exhibition view, photo: Severin Vogl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, exhibition view, photo: Severin Vogl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, exhibition view, photo: Severin Vogl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, exhibition view, photo: Severin Vogl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, exhibition view, photo: Severin Vogl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, exhibition view (detail), photo: Severin Vogl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, exhibition view, photo: Severin Vogl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, performance view, photo: Severin Vogl

Bilder einer Ausstellung, photo: Matthias Horn

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, exhibition view, photo: Severin Vogl

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival, performance stil, photo: Severin Vogl

Trajal Harrell Hoochie Koochie X Bauhaus, photo: Max Colson



The festival “100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival” from 16 to 24 January in the Akademie der Künste in Berlin will kick off the nationwide Bauhaus anniversary in 2019 with a spectacular display of the performing arts.
Concerts, installations, theater, dance, discussion, workshops and clubs – the nine-day festival under the artistic direction of Bettina Wagner-Bergelt enables new encounters with the Bauhaus Theatre in a multitude of formats, and forges an arc ranging from notable historical Bauhaus testimonies to today’s avant-garde, through to the landmark changes and stimuli that the Bauhaus has contributed to contemporary art. The opening festival is part of the Federal Cultural Foundation’s extensive promotion of the Bauhaus anniversary.

The packed program presents more than 25 productions, including ten world premières and commissioned pieces, and two German début performances by some 150 participating artists and performers from all over the world.

On opening night, jazz pianist and composer Michael Wollny presents his concert creation, “Bau.Haus.Klang. Harmony”, in which he turns to the musical experiments of the Bauhaus with his colleagues Emile Parisien, Wolfgang Heisig, Leafcutter John and Max Stadtfeld.
Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier is the festival’s patron and will open the evening with a ceremonial address. Al live stream of the concert will be available on: www.arte.tv

Also celebrating its world première is the “Das totale Tanztheater” (Total Dance Theatre) virtual reality installation, a cooperation by Interactive Media Foundation with internationally acclaimed choreographer Richard Siegal and Artificial Rome, which explores the relationship between humans and machines using dance, and allows visitors to immerse themselves in the virtual stage world to do so. A three-dimensional audio and visual experience with choreography by Richard Siegal and music by the band "Einstürzende Neubauten" is offered by the 360 ° video Das Totale Tanz Theater, which also premieres during the festival.
Installation and video are enhanced by film and exhibits (Kunst.Figur.Kostüm) and the Audio.Space.Machine audio parcours created by wittmann/zeitblom especially for the festival.

Richard Siegal contributes another world première to the opening festival with Txtorrent.
Together with actress Sandra Hüller and sound artist Alva Noto he investigates the Bauhaus artists’ handling of language, theater and reality.

Language and its significance are also a key theme in Samuel Beckett’s piece, Krapp’s Last Tape. Robert Wilson, one of the world’s leading theater makers, has shown the work in numerous countries around the world, and will now stage it for the first time in Germany as part of the opening festival.

In the tradition of the legendary Bauhaus parties, Bauhaus.Club 2.019: Hyper Culture is a party for the 21st century. Along with American choreographer Trajal Harrell, who presents his performance exhibition from London’s Barbican Centre in a new version with “Hoochie Koochie X Bauhaus”, pop icons Mykki Blanco, Aisha Devi feat. Tianzhuo Chen, FAKA from South Africa, DJ Haram and many more international performers will celebrate the plurality of the present in a vibrating club night with dance, show, rap, hip-hop, costumes and role changes.

With Signalraum.Best Practice Horst Konietzny brings another commissioned production to Berlin, where he explores Walter Gropius’ thesis of the positive changeability of the world through collaborative, aesthetic practice with a programme of installations, concerts, performances, blind dates and discussions. The theme and basic motif of all performances is playing with UNIKATEN (UNICA), musical instruments the performers have developed themselves, from a sewing machine to a mini-robot, and which incorporate the connection of different disciplines of art, performance and craftwork.

The Licht.Schatten.Spuren installation presents the works of László Moholy-Nagy by contrasting them with those of various contemporary artists, which explore the secrets of light and shadow, and recognize them as magical elements of the theatre, film and photography. The works of renowned artists Christian Boltanski (Théâtre d’ombre, 1989), Tim Lee (Light-Space-Module 2007) and Jan Tichy (installation no. 30 – Lucia) are presented along with commissioned pieces of newcomers, artists and scientists, such as Quadrature (Noise Signal Silence) and Tim Otto Roth (Sun on Stage).

One Million is a project by Viennese artist Uli Aigner, who has been connecting people all over the world since 2014 with one million pottery receptacles as a social sculpture. For the 100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival she presents a new world collection, with which she reacts to the various Bauhaus forms – 206 receptacles, one for each country on the planet.

Anne Nguyen’s Compagnie Par Terre takes breakdancing and hip-hop from the street to the stage. In Autarcie (….) the dancers deconstruct hip-hop moves and put them in relation to geometry and architecture. Award-winning film maker Katrin Rothe produces a live animated film theatre on Johannes Itten’s theory of colour with Ohne Farbe geht nichts (Nothing works without colour!). With its Über den Klee piece, the United Puppets theater group offers children and families access to the Bauhaus, where it relates events from Paul Klee’s life with perfect copies of his original puppets. 


The Bauhaus Agents Programme presents a selection of documentation and results from its
mediation work. An extensive offering of workshops provides children, young people and families the opportunity to get closer to various aspects of the Bauhaus in an experimental way. And Torsten Blume from Bauhaus Dessau provides Bauhaus selfies and photo gymnastics à la Bauhaus with costume pieces and props for outfitting as “Bauhaus dancers”.

The historical testimonies of the Bauhaus are presented with Oskar Schlemmer’s Triadic Ballet and Pictures at an Exhibition of Wassily Kandinsky’s work. Catalan dancer and choreographer Cesc Gelabert presents a further début performance within this framework with the reconstruction of the Bauhaus Stick and Hoop dances produced especially for the opening festival.

The festival program is expanded by the discursive format, Bauhaus Theater Experimental Field, where renowned researchers and artists intensify and discuss topics of the festival, moderated by Nicolas Flessa.

Advance sales for all opening festival events have started via the Academy of the Arts’ ticket sales office. You’ll also find all information online at www.bauhausfestival.de.

100 jahre bauhaus. Das Eröffnungsfestival is an initiative of the Bauhaus Berlin Dessau Weimar Cooperation and is supported by the Federal Cultural Foundation. With the friendly support of Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe. The festival is staged in cooperation with the Academy of the Arts, Berlin.