Görlitz dance piece finds ideal location in the synagogue

The dance piece “Jawoll!” by the Gerhart-Hauptmann-Theater is about power, seductiveness and violence as a misguided path out of powerlessness.

The theatre's production ‘Jawoll!’ addresses the appeal and danger of authoritarian systems. The alternative venue could not have been more appropriate.

Ines Eifler

04.02.2023

[SOURCE]

Bellowing, fists raised, the crowds roam the landscape. They follow the Führer, allow themselves to be seduced, incited to brawls.

The Görlitz dancers wear shiny leather suits reminiscent of uniforms, the gestures are martial, the interaction is brutal. At times, you seem to hear skulls crashing on the synagogue's hard stone floor, even though there is a shimmering metallic dance floor on top (set: Britta Bremer). Then, in poetic dance images, the young women and men tell of how beautiful and fulfilling life can be when great love is found.

Yet violence is a hallmark of the family that the protagonist experiences as the child of an authoritarian father and a submissive mother. And violence runs through his life as something from which he seeks to escape and yet which inevitably returns, even though love offers hope of redemption.


In the dance piece “Jawoll!” by the Gerhart-Hauptmann-Theater at the Cultural Forum Görlitz Synagogue, martial marches take place.

Choreographers Dan Pelleg and Marko E. Weigert developed the new dance piece ‘Jawoll!’, which celebrated its acclaimed premiere on Saturday, with their dancers based on theories by Erich Fromm and Theodor W. Adorno. In the 1940s, Fromm sought an answer to the question of why totalitarian movements such as fascism or bolshevism have such an appeal to so many.

The two great philosophers of the 20th century believed in a type of person who, having experienced oppression, develops a personality that admires strength, longs for hierarchies and conformity, glorifies violence and despises individuality.

At the Görlitz Cultural Forum Synagogue, the alternative venue for ‘Jawoll!’ following the water damage to the main stage of the Görlitz Theatre, one gains an inkling of the connection between oppression, seduction, humiliation and violence: when Nirvana's ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ whets the appetite for youthful rebellion and revolt within the group.

When you see the manipulative power with which dancer Elise de Heer, in the role of the leader, subjugates, torments and at the same time binds people to herself. And when you recognise not only human beauty in the two powerful bodies high up on the synagogue marble, but also the frightening resemblance to images photographed by Leni Riefenstahl and cast in bronze by Arno Breker.


The former synagogue is the ideal location for this accomplished production full of allusions, key motifs and warnings for the future from history, premiering shortly after Holocaust Memorial Day.

Transforming this history-laden space into a theatre venue was not easy, however. ‘A lot of coordination with the cultural service and the monument protection authorities was necessary beforehand,’ says Dan Pelleg. The fantastic space had to be protected from spirited movements and the risk of injury to the dancers had to be minimised.

‘We weren't able to realise some of the things we had in mind,’ says Marko E. Weigert. ‘On the other hand, the space inspired us to come up with new ideas.’ For example, the video and lighting effects projected into the large round dome are much more striking than on a flat screen. And the fact that the audience can see the action in the centre from all sides and everyone has their own perspective is something that is otherwise rarely realisable. As there is only room for 150 spectators in one performance, six more dates have been scheduled, starting on 4/5 February at 7.30pm/19pm.

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