Since 2017, the ITI Germany has been working on a review of the festival's 40-year history. Making aesthetic changes visible and tangible in their WORLD-wide representation has been inscribed in the festival THEATER DER WELT since its first edition in 1981. Today, in times of arts that have become both pandemically conditioned and generally more digital, the questioning of "what remains" and "what does not remain?" is a changed and different one than it was in the 1980s or 1990s. Still, what remains of a festival that, like the fully curated 2020 festival, though postponed, never took place in the way it was originally conceived?
With our exhibition and installation, satellite of the 2021 festival in Düsseldorf, we turn our gaze to all previous editions, which were shaped both by the festival's own structure and the respective temporal and spatial contexts of origin as unique and concentrated work formats. The DIGITAL ARCHIVE installation, accessible online for the first time, provides insight into the development of individual artists' careers and participation in THEATER DER WELT through the networking of the stored data.
The interactive installation makes it possible to view posters, press kits and evening programmes from all four decades. The THEATER DER WELT archive sees itself as an archive in the making, which is constantly being supplemented and completed by research, interviews and new material. We would be happy to receive your help as a former participant or visitor of the festival: we look forward to your contributions and stories and perhaps even one or two mysterious items from your collection!
The exhibition can be visited until the end of 2021. Furthermore, viewing and using the installation is possible at any time on site in the Media Library for Dance and Theatre in Berlin. We ask for registration via mediathek@iti-germany.de.
Opening hours: mon-fri from 10-17 hrs. Permanent exhibition until the end of 2021. Location: Kunstquartier Bethanien, ITI Office, Mariannenplatz 2, 10997 Berlin. Registration and contact: mediathek@iti-germany.de