Burkina Faso: Where Schlingensief Is Building His Festival House
Schlingensief on site in Burkina Faso (Photo: Aino Laberenz)
22 December 2009
The secret is out. For a long time, Christoph Schlingensief kept quiet about where he plans to build a festival house in Africa, but now the decision has been made. His dream – with the support of the Goethe-Institut – will come true near Ouagadougou.
The happy news arrived at the end of the year: the cornerstone for the opera house will be laid in January. During the summer, Schlingensief already hinted that the capital city of Burkina Faso was his favourite, but the final decision took a while. The project almost seemed to have been given up, so the interest is all the greater now. On Friday, when the decision was made known, there was , a lengthy report on Tagesthemen and on ZDF’s Nachtstudio the artist reported in detail about the project and his decision. He was also able to fill the entire feuilleton section of this week’s Zeit with articles about Africa.
On Monday, 13 containers were sent on their way from the Ruhrtriennale to set up the first building for the “opera village” about 45 minutes from West African Ouagadougou. “We call the project Learning from Africa. It won’t be anything like Bayreuth, but instead is intended to support the local cultural strengths.”
Schlingensief in Africa: “Big man, what’s the plan?”
The contracts for the project have already been signed and sealed. Schlingensief and the cultural minister of Burkina Faso signed an agreement whereby five hectares of land are being made available to him for the festival house.
Schlingensief can count on plenty of support for the ambitious project. According to the artist, German president Horst Köhler himself asked the president of Burkina Faso for help. The Goethe-Institut and the Bundeskulturstiftung are also on Schlingensief’s side. Celebrities such as the writer Henning Mankell, pop musician Herbert Grönemeyer and film director Roland Emmerich are each donating 100,000 euros.
The complex will encompass and theatre, a school for 500 students aged five to 17, a guest house, workshops, an infirmary as well as wells and solar collectors.
If everything goes as scheduled, the theatre can already be opened in March. Schlingensief wishes to premiere his own theatrical production in Burkina Faso at the start and then tour with it through Europe. “I will not exploit the African city to do my own thing there,” the German press agency quotes the 49-year-old director as saying. “We do not intend to transplant our culture, but to reveal the creative forces that are at home there, from which we can profit and learn a great deal.”
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