Meg Stuart establishes a rather unconventional frame of reference of continuance and eternity to superbly monumental music like Ludwig van Beethoven’s “Eroica” and Antonín Dvořák’s Ninth Symphony “From the New World” through to Meredith Monk’s “Astronaut Anthem”. Because, on a stage equipped with utterly strange props, her five dancers don’t react “normally”: they remain unmoved and don’t engage in the overwhelming greatness and rousing force of the music pieces selected by Alain Franco. Their “crazy” behaviour creates incredible, downright confusing tension. Celebrated by critics, Stuart’s piece “Built to last” is about the opposite of eternality. Absurd scenes, enacted beneath a planetarium fitted to the ceiling, collide with solemn sounds, excited text and breathtaking, on occasion disturbingly comical movements in such a way that their original meaning shatters. The music’s promise of an eternity awaiting man is transferred to a reality in which disintegration and innovation circle each other in a frantic dynamic
July 23, 2013 | Volkstheater
