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We are in this together but we are not the same
What is a festival center?
The new director of Theaterformen, Anna Mülter, approached us because she wanted to use her festival to initiate a credible discourse on climate justice beyond traditional theater spaces, in urban space and with urban society. She brought us into her team at an early stage and we spent a year and a half working closely together to negotiate which location and which form would be the most suitable intervention to give the topic of climate justice and marginalized perspectives in the city an appropriate place for a period of just under two weeks. Working in partnership with the invited artists, we spent a year and a half working closely with them to develop an idea that makes reference to the initiatives and artists in terms of form and function, and because the discourse on climate justice also includes the topics of accessibility and paths to a more inclusive city, we said that we definitely wanted to open up a space for the city lab that is otherwise inaccessible.
The four-lane elevated road behind the main station at a height of 6 m can be described as a traffic junction, a vivid example of an oversized urban planning disaster at all levels from the age of the car-friendly city - previously intended and accessible to no one but cars. It was a logical step for us to open up this place, which is equally inaccessible to all visitors, and to play it, and together with the festival team we were able to convince the administration. For three weeks, this main traffic artery was completely closed to cars (which caused a lot of excitement and attention), turning the bridge not only into a new form of festival center, but also into a public terrace.
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As people who belong to marginalized groups often feel “invisible”, their perspective on the world seems “unseen” and the festival should be about making different perspectives visible, we decided to use gigantic mirrors to make a part of the city disappear in order to draw attention to the project. The scenographic and narrative power of the theater - in combination with this architectural intervention - was intended to create a short-term location that offers space for artistic and activist debate and can thus generate a dialogue with the local urban society that is not possible on several levels in this form and intensity in the “closed” space of the theater.
With the help of a spatial-artistic intervention, a disruption was thus created in everyday urban life, which illuminated the central themes and perspectives of the Theaterformen festival, brought them out of the theater into public space and thus also into public perception. The core of the design is a seamlessly mirrored bar made of scaffolding elements. The structure juts out over the bridge on both sides of an elevated road, giving the impression that part of the bridge is missing. A clearly monofunctional urban space was temporarily appropriated and reinterpreted.
The bridge thus became a gigantic urban open space that urban society was able to appropriate for 11 days, and the confrontation in particular (you can’t put anything more in the way of citizens in Hanover than on this bridge) actually created a dialog with local urban society that would never have been possible on several levels in this form and intensity in the “closed” space of the theater. In this way, a discussion about climate justice and the social role of art was sparked not just for a short time, but throughout the city, thus creating a longer-lasting awareness of marginalized perspectives.
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This “conspicuous invisibility” of the design was intended to draw attention to the themes of the festival. And indeed: during the festival, the closure of the bridge was THE topic in the city, no matter which café you sat in during this time, no matter which newspaper you opened - everywhere in Hanover people were discussing and arguing whether the art justified this measure or not. (We even “made it” onto the front page of the Bild newspaper! When was the last time an architectural intervention in Hanover achieved that?) The scenographic and narrative power of the theater - in combination with this architectural intervention - has thus created a short-term location that not only offers space for artistic and activist debate, but especially through the confrontation (there is probably nothing more in the way of the citizens in Hanover than on this bridge) really creates a dialogue with the local urban society that would never have been possible on several levels in this form and intensity in the “closed” space of the theater. In this way, we have created not just brief attention, but a longer-lasting awareness of marginalized perspectives.
Theater should be accessible to everyone and be a part of society. That is why it is so special when a theater festival takes place in such a public space and actually takes up space that would otherwise have a different function, as it also reaches people who would otherwise not come into contact with theater. The viewer’s perspective is not only metaphorically changed by the use of mirrors, but actually changed. The mirror effect creates a visual break in the urban fabric and is also an architectural invitation to self-reflection.
We particularly enjoyed working intensively with Sophia Neises and Noa Winter, who advised us and the festival on the subject of accessibility. For example, a tactile wayfinding system and site plans with Braille were created.
Taxpayers’ association considers theater on closed Raschplatz high street “excessive”.
