Germany

Over the course of 2 weeks in the summer of 2006, 12 teaching artists from New York, Russia and Australia teamed up in pairs to work with groups of students from three public high schools in Freiburg, Germany. The thesis behind their work was to employ the art of dance to help teens in Germany work through their feelings about the traumatic history of the Holocaust, and to invest themselves into the group creation of dances that reflected and resulted from this process. The project was entitled “Dances for the Blue House”, referring to the building, converted into a living museum, that serves as the physical reminder of what had been a thriving Jewish community in the adjacent town of Breisach until Krystallnacht and the subsequent deportations.

The teaching artists comprised six members of Battery Dance Company in New York, four members of Drastic Action in New York, a guest teacher from the teen program SMILE in Novosibirsk, Russia and a guest teacher from Buzz Dance Theatre in Perth, Australia. The project was conceived, planned and supervised by choreographers Jonathan Hollander and Aviva Geismar, artistic directors of Battery Dance Company and Drastic Action respectively. Both Hollander and Geismar had deep connections with the effort surrounding the Blue House --- Hollander as a friend of nearly 4 decades with Dr. Christiane Walesch-Schneller, founder of the Blue House project, and Geismar, as the descendant of a Jewish family originally from Breisach.

The two choreographers and their dance companies worked together in planning curriculum and discussing approaches to this highly experimental project. They also took part in training sessions beforehand with people who could lend a special perspective to the work they would be doing: Arne Lietz of Facing History & Ourselves; Ralph Eisemann, a Holocaust Survivor, son of the last Cantor of Breisach, and former resident with his family of the Blue House itself; Professor Dan Bar-On, noted author and trainer, who met with Jonathan Hollander at Ben-Gurion University one year prior to the project, and with the dancers of Battery Dance Company in Breisach. These trainings helped prepare, encourage and validate the teaching artists for their special task in Germany. All of the teaching artists were experienced in working with youth, but engaging with the Holocaust theme introduced a new dimension into their role as facilitators and teachers.

The German teens who participated in the project were, for the most part, previously untutored in dance. Ages of the participants ranged from 13 – 19. The two groups at Kepler School included a mixture of boys and girls. At Lessing Schools, there were exclusively girls, and at Theodor Heuss Gymnasium, one courageous boy took part with a full complement of girls. The involvement of the special education program at the Lessing School, where students whose learning style is different and where, for many of whom, the German language and culture is a second one, gave another character to the group.

Noticeable and amazing in the workshops was the complete absence of cynicism, ridicule or self-consciousness that could have been expected in a mixed group of teens. The element of vulnerability was a key to the successful realization of the project and was exemplified by the teaching artists as well as the students. It was clear throughout that everyone was learning together.

The culmination of the workshops was six performances, three in the schools as part of end-of-year ceremonies, and three in nearby Breisach. The school performances were important in that a large proportion of parents, students and teachers saw the results of their schools’ workshops and the school was, in effect, putting a spotlight on the students who had volunteered to take part. Likewise the teachers from the schools who volunteered untold hours of time in planning, preparing and facilitating the workshops received the approbation of their administrators and fellow teachers.

The three performances that were held in the town of Breisach, included a site-specific work created by Aviva Geismar on the formerly named Judengasse and Synagogenplaz; followed by performances by Battery Dance Company and Drastic Action and all of the student works. These performances were to have been held at the outdoor amphitheater Festspiele; however, weather conditions precluded this option. Instead, the Mayor of Breisach and his staff made it possible for the performances to be shifted on a moment’s notice to the sports hall Breisgau Halle located on the border of the town.

U.S. Ambassador William Timken, Mayor Oliver Rein of Breisach and other officials and V.I.P. guests from the local region as well as those from Switzerland, France, Israel, Canada and the U.S. attended the opening day performances and ceremonies, their ranks swelled by local community members of all ages. The two subsequent performances were similarly well attended. An overall audience tally has been approximated at 1,500, a huge audience for such a small town.

The impact of Dances for the Blue House is evident through the achievement of the 100 German high school students whose lives were changed through the workshop experience.

During the week of January 27th, 2005, the 60th Anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz, the American choreographers Aviva Geismar and Jonathan Hollander traveled to Germany on a grant from the U.S. Government to present their project “Dances for the Blue House.”

Dancers, students, teachers and community, foundation, corporate and government leaders offered to join the project, strengthening and expanding it into a truly bilateral effort. Together they have forged a joint approach to the exploration of a universal issue: how do the next generations of Germans and Americans respond to the Holocaust?

At the heart of this expansive program of international cultural exchange is The Blue House project of Breisach, that demonstrates poignantly and powerfully the actions individuals can take to change attitudes and air social and historical injustices in their communities. The Blue House is an old building which served as the gathering place Battery Dance Company in “Secrets of the Paving Stones” by J. Hollander for Breisach’s 300-year- old Jewish community up until the community’s demise. After decades of neglect and decay, the house was slated to be torn down in 1999. Instead, it was purchased by a group of community members, the Förderverein, and restored as a living museum and memorial. With the building as a base, the Forderverein searched for the survivors of Breisach’s Jewish Community and their descendents. These individuals have returned to Breisach three times at the invitation of the Forderverein and the town government, and have shared their histories with community members and schools. The Forderverein, in its endeavor to enlarge the scope of its programs, has invited Geismar and Hollander to develop this new initiative joining art and social consciousness.

Jonathan recalls that Walking through the streets of Breisach and Freiburg during those days of summer, 2006, was like time-traveling. He said:

I passed shoulder-to-shoulder with University students, holiday revelers, shopkeepers and shoppers, while simultaneously feeling the presence of the Jewish deportees, Nazi soldiers and everyday people of the 1930’s and 40’s in a surreal, layered march of time. The teenagers of Freiburg schools were unflinching as they created their emotional choreographies, avoiding the easy pull of show-off dancing; exposing a profound depth of feelings through movement. They tore at my heart, those young people, giving me renewed hope for the future and a surety that the ghosts I passed on the streets were smiling.

Each workshop follows the parameters Battery Dance employs in all of its Dancing to Connect programs: +/- 20 students, ages 14 and up, comprise each workshop; 20 hours of workshop time is spent in the creation of an original dance work in which the participants generate movement sequences that are shaped by BD teaching artists into finished works of choreography which the participants perform on a large stage with fully professional theatrical conditions alongside performances by Battery Dance from its repertoire.

The unique element of this initiative is in the composition of each workshop group – a mixture of refugees, some of whom are unaccompanied minors, with their German counterparts. Changes were observed in each workshop – German students began to cross the chasm that separates them from refugees, refugees became more at ease in expressing themselves physically and verbally, stories were shared and empathy increased. By the performance day, groups were cheering each other, participants from different backgrounds formed an indivisible ensemble, pride was overflowing. Refugees from conflict zones in Syria, Afghanistan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia and elsewhere had made their way to Germany in harrowing conditions, escaping from unimaginable devastation. Seeing them free themselves, at least temporarily, from the grip of their nightmarish past, and their hankering for their families and friends back home, was tremendously moving.

In Frankfurt, five senior students and recent graduates from the prestigious Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst trained under the BD teaching artists, becoming conversant in the Dancing to Connect rubric and assisting our staff in translation and program direction. A Syrian refugee dancer and a former Dancing to Connect participant were similarly trained in Brandenburg; as were two professional hip hop dancers in Magdeburg.