Press Releases

New artistic director Johan Simons has positioned the Ruhrtriennale programme under the leitmotif: “Seid umschlungen” – a gesture of artistic, social and geographical inclusion.

“In his three years as Artistic Director of the Ruhrtriennale, Heiner Goebbels has successfully shown how to astonish and enchant audiences of all types with new and radically different types of music theatre.” Ute Schäfer, Minister of Culture for the region of Northe Rhine-Westphalia

“What characterizes the Ruhrtriennale are the interactions between artists and spaces. These make strong artistic experiences possible for all of us and they are my highest priority: where else does one have the freedom to allow something to develop without compromise?” Heiner Goebbels in the editorial for the programme of the Ruhrtriennale 2014
 

Heiner Goebbels, Artistic Director of the Ruhrtriennale 2012/2013/2014 and Lukas Crepaz, Managing Director of Kultur Ruhr GmbH, present an initial assessment of the Ruhrtriennale 2014 today in Bochum. The Ruhrtriennale, in its third and final season under Heiner Goebbels, ends this weekend, 26^th -28^th September 2014, with, among others, further performances of Surrogate Cities Ruhr, manger, Monument 0, with the presentation of the Children’s Choice Awards in Duisburg and a concert by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra at the Jahrhunderthalle Bochum. Johan Simons will become the new Artistic Director of the Ruhrtriennale 2015-2017. The next season will run from 14 ^th August to 27^th September 2015.

To mark the ending of the Ruhrtriennale 2014, there is a special offer: on presentation of a ticket for the 2014 season, visitors will receive free entry on 3^rd and 4^th October to the installation KUNSTMUSEUM by Gregor Schneider at the Kunstmuseum Bochum...

The Ruhrtriennale 2014 starts this weekend. In addition to the three premieres of stage productions and one nighttime concert, three exhibitions are opening in Essen and Duisburg: two film installations at the Museum Folkwang and the walk-on installation Melt in the Duisburg Landschaftspark. Melt, for which admission is free, will start swinging from 15.00 hours today. The spatial sculpture by Gregor Schneider which was also planned for the opening weekend in Duisburg can no longer be shown following its cancellation by the Lord Mayor, KUNSTMUSEUM, an entirely new work by Gregor Schneider can be seen instead in Bochum from 29^th August...

Duisburg, 6^th August 2014 – Bochum, Duisburg and Essen are once again the centre of attention for international artists on the opening weekend of the Ruhrtriennale from 15^th to17 ^th August.  Ten days before the festival opens, Artistic Director Heiner Goebbels and Managing Director of Kultur Ruhr Gmbh Lukas Crepaz will report today in the Gebläsehalle of the Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord on rehearsals and their final preparations. This is the first time that the opening premiere of the Ruhrtriennale will be held in Duisburg, with the staging of De Materie by the Dutch composer Louis Andriessen, a remarkable work of 20^th century music theatre.

Gregor Schneider will realise a new work for the Ruhrtriennale at the Kunstmuseum Bochum. Under the title KUNSTMUSEUM he will investigate the location and function of the art museum. Following the cancellation of his planned site specific sculpture totlast for the Lehmbruck Museum in Duisburg by the Lord Mayor of the city of Duisburg, realising this work in Bochum is a considerable achievement. The exhibition will open on 29^th August, two weeks after the beginning of the festival, but will remain open after the festival in October.

The artwork planned for the Ruhrtriennale 2014 by internationally renowned installation artist Gregor Schneider at the Lehmbruck Museum in Duisburg cannot be realised. Lord Mayor Sören Link informed the Artistic Director of the Ruhrtriennale, Heiner Goebbels, by telephone a short time ago that irrespective of further inspections by the building control office the artwork was not suited to the city at the present time. The artist, the Ruhrtriennale’s artistic team and the Museum are markedly critical of the way in which the matter has been handled.

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The Society of Friends and Supporters invites 50 students to the Ruhrtriennale. The Ruhrtriennale gives away 50 free festival passes for students up to the age of 27 years. This offer has been financed since 2012 by the Society of Friends and Supporters of the Ruhrtriennale, and allows 50 students to visit all Ruhrtriennale events free of charge.

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Since Matthew Herbert's concert performance 20 Pianos on 23. August is already sold out, there will be an additional performance on 24. August at PACT Zollverein. With 20 Pianos, Matthew Herbert tells the stories of twenty unique pianos from all over the world. From Steinways at the famous Abbey Road Studios or great concert halls to out of tune pianos that pass away their existence in privat living rooms: Herbert photographed them all, sampled their specific sound, and recorded brief stories about their origin.

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The international festival of the arts with numerous highlights: music theatre, dance, concerts, film and visual arts in industrial heritage sites in Bochum, Duisburg, Essen and Gladbeck.
Advance booking for all productions opens today, 2^ndApril 2014.

The Ruhrtriennale, in its third and final year under the artistic direction of Heiner Goebbels, places its focus from 15th August to 28th September on boundary-breaking world premieres and new productions by international artists. At its heart lie large scale music theatre productions and the relationship of the visual arts with dance, performance, film and concerts. For the first time the Ruhrtriennale will open in Duisburg, where an excpetional work of 20^th century music theatre will be staged: De Materie by the Dutch composer Louis Andriessen, which opens up new perspectives beyond opera. The production in the Duisburg Kraftzentrale (which features, amongst others, the Ensemble Modern Orchestra and ChorWerk Ruhr) is the first fully-staged performance since the world premiere in Amsterdam in 1989.

Surrogate Cities Ruhr in the enormous Kraftzentrale in the Duisburg Landschaftspark is the exceptional event of 2014. The orchestral cycle by Heiner Goebbels is the musical portrait of an imaginary city, which Mathilde Monnier will direct specially for the Ruhrtriennale as a choreography for the Ruhrgebiet with over 140 performers from the region and the Bochumer Symphoniker. The multi award-winning Italian theatremaker Romeo Castellucci is represented at the festival with two new works: in the Jahrhunderthalle Bochum he presents the opera Neither, a result of the encounter between Morton Feldman and Samuel Beckett in the 1970s, with the Duisburger Philharmoniker conducted by Emilio Pomàrico. Castellucci directs Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps as a dance from the dust of bones in the Gebläsehalle Duisburg.

Further highlights of this year’s festival include the long-awaited world premiere of Boris Charmatz’ manger, which focusses on the topic of eating, and the concert by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam in the Jahrhunderthalle Bochum. The Samoan performance artist and choreographer Lemi Ponifasio returns to the Ruhrtriennale together with the MAU Company and his new work I AM. In the Maschinenhalle Zweckel in Gladbeck the young Swiss director Boris Nikitin brings three opera singers from three generations together on stage in the theatre performance Singers Without Shadows and offers the audience insights into their artist’s lives.

The visual artists Matthew Barney, Gregor Schneider, Tino Sehgal, Harun Farocki and the Brazilian artistic duo cantoni crescenti extend the Ruhrtriennale’s possible spaces with their installations, choreography and films.

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