Inhabiting
14.02. – 26.03.2022
Since the summer of 2021, Berlin artists have been conducting research on the grounds of the Humboldt Forum as part of Moving the Forum.
The third chapter, “Inhabiting,” deals with the content of taking possession of the new controversial urban space, and addresses who or what was not included or thought about in the process. Together with 10-15 participants each, three teams begin their artistic exploration on site for six weeks starting February 14.
The results can be experienced in various performances on March 26, 2022.
The Living Room
The dancers/choreographers Yotam Peled, Marie Hanna Klemm and Nitzan Moshe work in “The Living Room” with 15 participants ages 50+, placing the experienced body in the focus of their research. Together with their participants, they focus on relating their bodies to the public urban space and examine how these bodies can function as a bridge between past and present.
The Living Room is a nomadic performance process, an exploration and an expansion to spaces in the museum, interacting with them through a symbiosis.
„Our group consists of mature participants, with whom together we aim to construct intimate safe zones inside the Humboldt forum – homes which embody their individual fantasies and needs. We wish to make an experienced body, which has a history and stories to tell, present and moving in the museum, underlining the connection between the past and a tangible future.“
We crash
We build our home
We explore
Co-creating
Co-existing
Up-rising
We are the wild
memory
into a possible future
The three artists work on site for the entire residency period: A permanent “living and working room” is installed under the stairs on the 2nd floor, and a “home base” – a kind of permanent home – is created in the foyer. On Tuesdays and Saturdays, they work on site with participants.
The video gives a sneak preview of what they’re up to:
Yotam Peled was born in Kibbutz Beit-Keshet in Israel in ‘89. Since childhood he has practiced fine arts, athletics, and Capoeira. At the age of 21, after finishing service in the Israeli defense forces, he began dancing, and later on pursued higher education in contemporary circus. In 2015 he relocated to Berlin, and since then he has been working as a freelance performer with several European choreographers, among them Maura Morales, Yann L’Hereux, Troels Primdahl, Jill Crovisier and Mitia Fedotenko. He has been creating his own choreographic work, which toured festivals and venues in Israel, Germany, Poland, Italy, Spain, France, The Netherlands, Norway, North Macedonia, Luxembourg, Japan, Thailand and Vietnam. His solo performance ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ has received awards from Awaji Circus Art, Würzburg tanzSpeicher, MASDANZA, Gdansk Dance festival and Corpomobile Rome. His first ensemble work ‘Entropia’ was created in 2018, as part of ‘THINK BIG’ – a collaboration between the city opera of Hanover and TANZtheater International festival. Yotam was selected to participate in TalentLAB#19 platform in the Grand Theatre of Luxembourg, to create ‘ALPHA’ mentored by choreographer Hofesh Shechter. In November 2019 he was a resident choreographer in Skopje Dance Theater and in 2021/22 he will create new works for the graduates of EDCM, Canada, and Frontier Danceland, Singapore. Yotam has been a guest teacher and collaborator in Fontys Academy of Arts, Folkwang University of Arts, Dock11, Munstrum Theater, Cie. Hors Surface, Cooperativa Maura Morales, and Overhead Project.
Nitzan Moshe was born in 1991, she grew up in Hod HaSharon, Israel, where she began her dance training at the municipal ballet center and at HaRishonim middle school. She continued her dance studies at the Mosinzon high school complemented by after-hours training at the Steps school for performing arts and the Rose K. Sobel studio. Her IDF service as an outstanding dancer included one year internship with the BatSheva Ensemble and later pursuing her career further she worked with choreographers Roy Assaf and Odelia Kupferberg. In 2014, Nitzan joined the Vertigo Dance Company.
Marie Hanna Klemm, born in Wuppertal in 1992, is a Berlin-based dancer and choreographer who holds a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in dance and choreography from Folkwang University of the Arts.
She has worked with Tanztheater Wuppertal, Pina Bausch, Johannes Wieland, Henrietta Horn and Jakob Ahlbom and is currently collaborating with Yotam Peled & The Free Radicals, Jann Gallois -CieBurnOut, Jill Crovisier -JC Movement Production and João Cidade, among others.
Working on the border between theatre and dance, Marie continues to break new ground, both within and outside of herself. Deepening her identity as a performer, she actively creates and tours her own work. In 2019, she won the 2nd Jury Prize for her creation -one more drama- at the Gdanski Festival Tanca Solo Dance Contest.
Investing in the space between intuitive senses, natural instincts and the rational mind, Marie sees movement practice as the key to opening channels to the body’s subconscious and unlocking the creativity and knowledge that lies beneath. Her artistic approach seeks to better understand and make tangible complex structures of human behaviour and hidden emotional patterns by offering space for honest sharing, vulnerability and empathy.
Recollection in 3 colours
History as the sum of memories – in their project “Recollection in 3 colors”, pianist Rieko Okuda and double bassist Antti Virtaranta, together with their participants, explore the relationship between memories and history. Particularly in a place as historically charged as the Humboldt Forum, the encounter of history and memory is tension-filled. A sound installation with visual elements invites visitors to witness the findings.
Rieko Okuda is a pianist and a composer from Japan. She began to play Classical music at the age of 3. She also studied Music Therapy at Doshisha Women College. Music Therapy led her into Contemporary music and Improvised music. After she graduated from the college, she moved to USA to study Jazz music. She fell right into the Jazz scene in USA, performing with some of the great American Jazz musicians (Bob Mintzer, Jon Faddis, John Fedchock etc) at several jazz festivals such as North Texas Jazz Festival, Nortredam Jazz Festival to name a few. A couple of years later, she got interested in Free Jazz and Improvised music while she was in Phliladelphia. She performed with the great improvisers includes Marshall Allen (from San Ra Orchestra), Elliott Levine (recorded with Cecil Taylor), and Calvin Weston (recorded with Ornette Coleman). Her interests in Improvised music led her to move to Berlin. She performs with various musicians in Berlin ex. Tobias Delius, Axel Dörner, Els Vendaweyer, Linda Frederickson, ect. Also, she collaborates with contemporary dancers such as Yuko Kaseki, Akemi Nagao, and Annapaola Leso (from Sasha Waltz.) She performs at several experimental festivals: A’Larme Festival, JOE Festival Essen, Brda Contemporary Music Festival, XChange Festival, Experymental Festival, Flux Festival, and Soundance Festival to name a few.
Antti Virtaranta, a Swedish born Finn, is a bassist and composer. He studied and performed Jazz in Philadelphia, USA at the University of the Arts. He has performed everywhere from festivals to small coffee houses and in different styles from Free Improvisation to very Tradition Swing Jazz. During his studies he became interested in Free Improvisation and Free Jazz and shifted his focus to these styles. He currently resides in Berlin and performs regularly with different projects throughout Berlin. He has performed with Elliott Levin, Tristan Honsinger, Harri Sjöström, to name a few. Currently, Antti is exploring composition and improvisation and trying to come up with a notational system that communicates the musical direction without hindering the performer’s creativity. Using all of the various influences of jazz, rock and contemporary music he forms his individual vocabulary. Also a major focus is on his solo electronic and bass music that translates to the small group settings that he is involved in.
The March
Together with a group of BIPOC and white LGBTQ+ individuals, Adrian Blount and Telmo Branco’s performance-protest “The March” highlights the experiences of those marginalized in colonial and postcolonial societies.
“The March“ is a conglomeration of bodies, of living testaments. “The March” is a funeral, a parade, a riot, and a depiction of the varied and sometimes oppositional histories of BIPOC LGBTQ+ and white LGBTQ+ individuals. This performance protest invites the audience to travel through the trajectory of those who strive(d) under colonial and post-colonial societies.
Colonization was a process that happened inside and outside the colonizer’s land. It was a process endured by those whose individual and collective identities, did not coincide with the heteronormative culture of the colonizers.
Lands were colonized, knowledge was colonized, identities were colonized, bodies were colonized. Two options remained: to resist and suffer, or to adapt and disappear.
“The March” attempts to decolonize space and body. For the BIPOC LGBTQ+, it aims to acknowledge the plight colonialism had on their bodies, their minds, and their ancestors, by honoring their right to exist.
For the white LGBTQ+, it dives into the colonial heritage that has been transmitted, while acknowledging its forcefully and fatally imposed doctrine of gender and sexuality.
“The March” invites the museum visitors to a revolution. A revolution that aims to dismantle the imperial space, consciously recreated by the Berlin Palace, by exposing the polarizing fissure revealed when those oppressed and marginalized by its legacy inhabit that space.
Parent to Chance Aijuka/ Non Binary Femme Boi/Founder/Organizer/ Curator/DJ- Is based in Berlin by way of San Diego, CA. After attending San Francisco State to obtain their/her BA in theatre, she/they performed in New York, traveled across the country with a touring theatre troupe, then moved to Rhode Island to perform with various Brown University programs including the Center for Slavery and Justice, Brown/ Trinity and Trinity Repertory theatre. Since being in Berlin, Adrian has taught anti-racist and collective healing workshops with various organizations such as Dice Festival and Conference and AfriVenir, dj’d internationally, performed at Münchener Kammerspiele, Volksbühne, Gorki, Sophiensaele, Ballhaus Naunynstrasse and English Theatre Berlin (and others) and is the founder and lead organizer of the drag collective House of Living Colors for exclusively queer and trans BIPOC.
(They / Them) is an activist and interdisciplinary trans and non-binary artist trained in the fields of acting, performance art, physical theatre, and contemporary dance. Telmo Branco is originally from Portugal and based in Berlin. With a consideration for emotional sensitivity, their work is designed to reflect queer individuals and their oppressive history. Telmo Branco is currently developing “The Unspeakable”, a performance activism project that reflects the cultural stigmatization of child sexual violence, under a queer lens. This project served as platform to “The Unspeakable: Performance Interviews”: A series of 5 performance Interviews where invited queer artists speak and embody different forms of systemic violence: homophobia, queer and transphobia and hate crime, childhood sexual abuse, ableism, and racism/white supremacy. Their film “The Tradition – The Film” is currently in exhibition in galleries and film festivals. Besides developing their own work, they have collaborated with artists from different fields such as Veronica Riz (IT), Helena Waldmann (DE), Nir de Wolff (IL) , Annelie Andre (AT), Alexandra Pirici (RO), Falk Richter (DE), Lea Pitschke and Michael Baumann (DE), Shang-Chi Sun (TW) Ximo Flores (ES), etc.