»A short story about that itchy feeling when you want to break out and go wild but have nowhere to go.«

For our residency at PACT Zollverein we wanted to develop ›And Now The Screen Is Struck By Lightning‹, a piece that we had begun as a live film installation at Tropez Berlin in the Summer of 2019. Here instead is the first part of the lockdown version of this work. The second part will be presented online by Tropez later in the summer.

A work about Berlin and the idea of the West, And Now The Screen Is Struck By Lightning takes as its starting point Tabea Blumenschein’s performance as Her, the drunk in Ulrike Ottinger’s 1979 feature film Ticket Of No Return. Blumenschein was the ultimate West Berlin superstar, whose celebrity came to an abrupt end with the fall of the wall. For a time she was homeless, before spending her final years living at the city’s periphery. Berlin meanwhile, has made the opposite journey. A city that was once on the furthest edge of “Western“ Europe is now at its centre. And if there’s anything the 20th century has taught us, it’s that the centre cannot hold.

Video Krzysztof Honowski Based on a performance by Peter Cant and Krzysztof Honowski Script Peter Cant, Krzysztof Honowski, and Laura Sundermann Performance Bishop Black, Etoile Chaville, and Laura Sundermann

with the participation of Jemek Jemowit and Roman Driamov Costumes Ryan Chappell

Original Performance at Tropez, Berlin invited by Clare Molloy and Clara Meister, production in the framework of  ›Amour‹, Tropez, 2019, Online Premiere of Episode 2 in summer 2020 at Tropez

Biographies

Bishop Black is a British artist who works in the mediums of performance, dance, drag, and burlesque. His work concerns the use of the body as language and as a politicised tool. His most recent work with the director Shu Lea Cheang premiered at the 2019 Venice Biennale, and he has collaborated regularly with a diverse cohort of artists, including Bruce LaBruce, Erika Lust, Wojciech Kosma, Thomas Bo Nilson, and Peaches. These collaborations have been presented at such prestigious venues as the Chisenhale Gallery London, Berliner Ensemble, Deutsche Oper Berlin, and the Royal Festival Hall London. His contributions to queer and alt-porn were celebrated when he was a recipient of the 2017 ›PorYes Feminist Porn Award‹. Black’s first solo performance ›Becoming My Body‹ premiered at Ballhaus Naunynstraße as part of its Postcolonial Poly Perspectives festival in 2019.

Peter Cant is a theatre director and performance maker. A graduate of the Jerwood Opera Writing Programme, Peter works internationally, devising interdisciplinary per- formances which create spaces for encounters between artists, communities and audiences. He was librettist and director of ›Unborn in America‹ at ROH Linbury Studio and Vaults Festival.

His theatre installations with artist Krzysztof Honowski have been performed at the Barbican London, Yard Theatre London, Sound Acts Festival Athens, and Tropez Berlin. He has collaborated with jazz composer Trish Clowes for BBC Radio 3’s ›Late Junction‹ and ›Hear & Now‹. Peter’s work with young people includes Glyndebourne’s ›Tycho’s Dream‹, dramaturgy of the Barbican-Guildhall show Unleashed and a re-imagining of Janácek’s ›Jenufa‹ with ENO Baylis.

Together with Katharina Schenk he co-directed productions at Kyiv Gogolfest, Schloss Freudenberg Wuppertal, Dakh theatre Kyiv, and Deutsches Theater Berlin. In 2019 his site-specific performance ›Hooligan‹ premiered at Mystetskyi Arsenal Kyiv.

Etoile Chaville is an improvisation artist, dancer and singer. Her work merges contemporary dance, physical theatre, opera, chanson, humour and poetry. Originally graduated from the London Contemporary Dance School, Etoile is also a certified teacher of yoga and Action Theater.

She regularly performs pieces composed in real time in Berlin locations for experimental theatre, working in solo or collaboratively with her partner Meltem Nil and the artist Julian Datta. Her Cabaret duet ›Les Cigales Caramels‹ has toured for the last three years in Berlin concert venues. She has also worked as a dancer and performer for a wide range of dance & theater companies, including Karine Saporta, Heike Hennig & Co, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Mica Moca Project, Be, Une Petite Voix M’a Dit and the fashion house Hermès in Paris.

Krzysztof Honowski studied at the University of Cambridge, Slade School of Fine Art London, and Academy of Media Arts Cologne. He is currently a doctoral candidate at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna under the supervision of Prof. Diedrich Diederichsen.

His work has been presented extensively in Europe, including at Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, Zabludowicz Collection London, and Jewish Museum Berlin. Between 2013 and 2019 Honowski collaborated on live video performances with Peter Cant. First ›Alexandria‹ at The Yard Theatre London, then ›Kustom Kar Kommados Karaoke‹ in 2015 and 2016 at the Barbican London, Sound Acts Festival Athens, and a.m. London. ›A Pool Painted Black‹ followed in 2017 during Documenta 14 at Atopos Athens. In summer 2019 they presented ›And Now The Screen Is Struck By Lightning‹ at Tropez Berlin and published the artist's book ›Sincere Procedures‹.

›Beasts Of No Nation‹, Honowski's short film with Laura Sundermann premiered at the Ruhrtriennale 2019 and was selected for the Official German Competition of the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen 2020. The installation ›Kein Anschluss unter dieser Nummer‹ will be shown at the Kunstverein Leverkusen in November 2020.

Laura Sundermann, born in Cologne, studied drama at the Zurich University of the Arts from 2002 - 2006. Winner of the Oprecht Prize 2006. 2007-2011 part of director Karin Beier’s ensemble at Schauspiel Köln. Collaborations there with directors Karin Beier, Katie Mitchell, Robert Borgmann, Nuran D. Calis, Schorsch Kamerun, Viktor Bodo, Jette Steckel and Karin Henkel among others. Invited three times to the Berliner Theatertreffen between 2009 and 2011.

In 2009 she worked with Katie Mitchell at the Salzburger Festspiele. Further projects with Mitchell followed at the Staatsoper Berlin and the Schaubühne Berlin.

From 2013 - 2018 part of Nicola Bramkamp’s ensemble in Bonn. There she played Kriemhild in Thorleifur Örn Arnasson ›Die Nibelungen‹ and Richard III in Alice Buddeberg’s ›Wars of the Roses‹. Further collaborations with Jan-Christoph Gockel, Simon Solberg, Mina Salehpour, Simone Blattner, Friederike Heller, Sascha Hawemann and Volker Lösch.

In 2019 her and Krzysztof Honowski’s short film ›Beasts Of No Nation‹ premiered at the Ruhrtriennale and was subsequently shown in the Official German Competition of the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen 2020. In the coming season she will work or the first time at Schauspiel Frankfurt.