with: Cornelia Dörr, Franck Edmond Yao

Coproduction with Kampnagel Hamburg and Forum Freies Theater Düsseldorf. Supported by Fonds Darstellende Künste and Hamburgische Kulturstiftung

Duration: 65 min

For current performance dates click here:

https://www.gintersdorferklassen.org

 

Jury statement:

In a highly intelligent way, the duo with their production “Othello c’est qui“ have made their contribution to the topic cultural difference. They approach the myth Othello in a playful yet serious way. Via the meta level at the beginning, the performance leads us deeper and deeper into the games of the two characters, Othello and Desdemona, and comes much closer to Shakespeare than the participants might be aware of. The production gives a real impulse to German theatre in a political, aesthetic, as well as sensual way. We are looking forward to the performances at the International Theatre Festival Rotterdam, the Vienna Festival, and the Berlin Theatertreffen, which are connected to this prize.

Shakespeare’s Othello is considered the genuine black theatrical character and moreover, the character reveals how Europeans view the strange. Gintersdorfer/Klaßen contrast this view with an African self-concept and, in the encounter of two cultures on stage, let you experience their common and their distinguishing grounds.

A terrific play on love, theatre, and about what happens, when plays stop being plays.

Since 2005, director Monika Gintersdorfer and visual artist Knut Klaßen have been collaborating with Ivorian choreographer Franck Edmond Yao, on projects for productions, videos and exhibitions. In 2009, with their German-Ivorian team, their accomplishments included the four-part dance series “Logobi” and the Festival Abidjan Mouvement on the Ivory Coastwith support from the Goethe Institute. “7% Hamlet” premiered at the Deutsches Theater in Berlinin October. Also they frequently worked with Sophiensaele Berlin and the Kunsthaus Dresden. Knut Klassen lives in Berlin; Monika Gintersdorfer lives in Hamburg.

24.08.2010: the jury of the journal „tanz“, consisting of 29 international dance critics, nominated Gintersdorfer/Klaßen as the best company of 2010!

„This company with two names that isn´t really a company at all, Gintersdorfer/Klaßen, resembles an atomic nucleus. The dancers from the Ivory Coast are the protons, their German translators and co-dancers the neutrons, and their fusion sets free an energy which creates a high-speed productivity never seen before. It´s the African survival model.“
(Excerpt from the portrait published in the „tanz“ year book 2010)