“Contact Hof”, one of the iconic works of German choreographer Pina Bausch, who has had a decisive influence on the form and content of contemporary dance, will be performed at the National Theater from Wednesday, December 17th, in cooperation with the Pina Bausch Foundation.
Thirty-seven years after its premiere in Greece at the Herodeion by the Tanztheater Wuppertal in September 1988, this groundbreaking work is now being performed on the Schiller Building’s main stage in a production featuring exclusively Greek performers aged 21 to 55.
This stage revival is under the artistic direction of Josephine Ann Endicott and Daphne Kokkinou. Both have danced in dozens of works by great artists, and worked with fellow original cast members Anne Martin and Pina Bausch Foundation rehearsal director Scott Jennings to select the Greek cast. They all know “Kontakthof” well.
Josephine Ann Endicott, 75, danced in the 1978 premiere and served as the choreographer’s assistant for many years. She remembers everything about the group’s process from the beginning.
“I mainly participated in the early works of Pina Bausch. I joined the dance company in 1973. So by the time I arrived at the Contacthof in 1978, we had already performed a lot of revolutionary works and a lot of operas in dance form. We were already having tomatoes thrown at us, people leaving during performances, and audience members banging on the door. At that time, I was a member of the group. When I arrived at the Contacthof, people slowly started to come to me. ” Pina Bausch was no longer quitting and had become a cult figure with a new way of working that had nothing to do with dance, but for me there was something very unique and special about this woman that kept me there for so many years.
She was also very beautiful as a woman. First of all, she was able to influence people from a young age. Her idea was unique. This is how she approached questions and answers. I always felt like I could be myself in her group. It was what she was looking for and it was what I was looking for too. Thanks to Pina’s guidance, Joe is able to be himself in front of Pina. I was able to offer her everything I could. I was able to create several works that relate to people’s daily lives. Her work has always been interesting to me and I loved all the musical pieces in her work. she was a genius. I didn’t know that at the time. I wasn’t there just because she was a genius. I was there because I love her. ”
Daphne Kokkinou’s life and dance career also fundamentally changed when she saw a Pina Bausch performance in Athens in the 1980s. So he decided to continue his journey in Wuppertal, Germany after completing his studies at KST. He joined German Dance Theater in 1993 and became Pina Bausch’s assistant in 2002. What does he remember from the “Contacthof” at Herodion in 1988?
“I saw this play for the first time at the Herodeion in 1988, before leaving for Germany, when I was a student. I was moved. I remember very well and vividly the smiles the dancers showed to the audience during the cycle. It’s amazing how you remember after so many years. Later, when I joined her chorus, I started learning this piece with the help of Jo. I love dancing this piece. I danced it last year, and I plan to dance it again this summer.”
Thanks to my work at the National Theater, I have a better understanding of what I’m doing on stage by teaching me every move, every scene, every piece of work. Before, you may have only seen things through your own perspective, your own role. But now, suddenly, being downstage, I learned so much about what my colleagues were doing on stage, all the preparations, all the procedures. The work we did for this show in Athens was amazing. It’s not just the teaching, it’s the whole experience. Dancing this particular piece is really amazing because you become a co-creator of it and become part of its world. ”
Josephine Ann Endicott staged several revivals of the Contacthof. How did you work with the 23 Greek actors and performers? How was the cast for the Greek production chosen?
“I thought it was a great idea to do this particular play with Greek performers, because at the Contacthof there is more acting than dancing. Of course, we never pretend in the play. We are ourselves on stage. Anyone who comes to audition and pretends is hired. We didn’t, because we were looking for real people who could speak, stand, rhyme, express themselves, show their true selves. We chose performers that we liked, people who say something with their eyes, their face, their aura.
Many of the actors took a while to understand the spirit of the show. It’s not easy to get into the world of Pina Bausch. That’s why we needed to motivate them in the play to unlock and find their own identity. Just be yourself and show yourself as you are. It sounds so simple, but the simplest things are often the most difficult. However, we are very happy with what we chose. I was really happy to be able to produce this work. To be honest, I love Greek humor. I love how they always use their hands when speaking. ”
Contacthof premiered at the Wuppertal Opera House in 1978 and is an early landmark for Pina Bausch and a pivotal example of the collaboration with set and costume designer Rolf Borzik that shaped the company’s visual language at a critical time. The play continues to tour today, often with different generations in attendance. In 2000, ladies and gentlemen aged 65 and over participated, and in 2008, teenagers aged 14 to 18 participated.
Human relationships are central to the play. Love, desire, conflict, the need for communication, tenderness, violence, and loneliness. Men and women meet in dance halls and reveal aspects of themselves with the purpose of connection. The way these relationships are portrayed is sometimes humorous and sometimes cruel. Emotional conflicts, repetitive movements and gestures unfold on stage, inviting the viewer to participate.
“For me, the Contacthof is a meeting place of 23 people who come together in a dance hall in search of human contact. I mean, we, the performers, come with ourselves to lose ourselves and find ourselves. I think that’s what happens to people who watch the play. For me, it’s a place of freedom, a place where you can be yourself, the good and the bad.
The biggest challenge for me is the absolute combination of acting and dancing. And that makes me very happy, because that’s who I am and what I’ve been doing: being an actor and a dancer. How Pina Bausch combined these two arts is a challenge in itself for me. What was I supposed to do? I’m very passionate about this project. I gave everything I had, but I wasn’t giving physically or mentally. It required a lot of physical labor and a lot of studying. I spent a lot of time finding my own story within this project. Because it’s not clear. There is no clear story in this play, so we each go on our own journey. And I have spent a lot of time searching for that journey,” says Melina Contis.
Alexandros Vardaxoglou also studies acting and dancing. It was his dream to participate in this performance. We see all the relationships big and small that arise between them, eroticism, love, friendship, rivalry, jealousy, the desire to stand out, to be loved, to be noticed.
This play contains a huge variety of relationships and emotions. It always transitions into something different. In a sense, I feel like I’m looking at a microcosm of society. I often feel like I’m in a village with all the good and bad of a closed world. Here you will find everything from the smallest world to the largest. There are big changes. It is a poetic work, a poetic world.
I treat this material with awe and love. Because I’ve been watching her work since I was little, when I was in dance school. When I work on her work, it sometimes feels like a lie. I can’t believe that I suddenly entered this world. I feel so lucky to have been able to enter her world and feel something of what the people who met her felt. I often feel like I’m meeting her because I’m participating in her work. ”
Daphnis Kokkinos has been a permanent member of the Wuppertal Dance Theater since 1993. In 2002 I became an assistant to a German choreographer. What makes her work so special?
“What makes Pina and her work so special is the way she expresses her dance. It’s what she wanted to say with her dance, and the way she used her dancers to touch a little bit of what was inside their hearts and souls. What she had was something very, very real. That’s why she wanted to say it in all of us. It’s something that belongs to everyone and that we all have in common. She was able to make it dance and move it and put it on stage. It’s something that fires us up and fascinates us. These are things that we carry with us every day.
Pina Bausch was able to express these everyday objects as true art. When we were working together and doing very small things, we said this is stupid. But she made it that way and put it somewhere else, and suddenly this little thing became important. When we worked on the project with her, we had a lot of freedom. It was amazing and gave me the freedom to explore and express myself. So I think what makes her special is that she took everyday little things and turned them into art on stage. ”