It's going to get worse

Do palaces always signal the end of an era? When Ludwig II built his peacock throne in the socalled Moorish Kiosk, he only had nine years left to live, when the GDR finally finished its palace, it was far past its zenith and on a downward spiral to the end of a system. And yet, in the middle of a global crisis, we are building a castle in the centre of Berlin? That does not bode well.
Ersan Mondtag and his ensemble interrogate the ruins of the past and the present. But how does that work really? When the guests can’t come, the songs can’t play, the party can’t take place. Benny Claessens, Kate Strong, Orit Nahmias and Çiğdem Teke wait, think, dance – about the absent, about poetry, art – and what’s the point of all that after all.

Photo: Esra Rotthoff