The Martin E. Segal Theater Center presents
"talk to us"
At the Segal Theatre Film and Performance Festival 2024
A film by
Kirsten Burger
Theater, Circus / Movement, Film, Mime, Performance Art, Other
This film will be available to watch online on the festival website May 16th onwards for 3 weeks.
About The Film
Country
Germany
Language
German
Running Time
93
minutes
Year of Release
2022
Hardly anyone speaks in 'speak to us of'. It is rather the eyes and gestures of the 4 protagonists that speak, like in the finest silent film tradition. Their natures seem isolated, their actions form a kind of fabric. It seems as if they are the sum of a single soul in its longing, its love lust, its loneliness. "No one hears me scream, my fears are discreet, but now, in the midst of the strongest of ocean swells, I keep my eyes wide open, and under the spray, I can make out shapes, then I am the medusa, the little daughter of the earth and the sea.“ Many stories from two world wars have not been told until today. And yet they are inscribed in the deep tissues of the body, are passed on and want to be explored. A journey of images that invites us to wander through this landscape of souls.
My grandfather is a Stalingrad survivor. In 1945 he escaped from the encirclement of the embattled city and made his way back to Vienna on foot. For the rest of his life, he not only had to cope with physical war wounds, but also suffered from the mental consequences of the war: he hardly spoke to people and only communicated with his horses. This pain and the great silence was transferred to my father, who also has difficulties talking about it to this day. And this in itself has an impact on me and my life. In "Talk to us", I have tried to explore these transmissions and the unspeakable, the barely comprehensible.
"TALK TO US" a Film by Kirsten Burger / Aska: Laura Vogel / Alina: Cox Ahlers / Zola: Franziska Pack/ Lola: Clara Gracia / Directed by Kirsten Burger /Screenplay by Kirsten Burger / Produced by Cox Ahlers / Editor Daniela del Pomar /Cinematographer Anne Braun/ Music Composition Mabe Fratti / Production Manager :Cox Ahlers, Kirsten Burger, Alice Greenhill / Sound Design Olaf Giesbrecht / Voices: Laura Vogel, Cox Ahlers, Olaf Griesbrecht /Sound Recordist:Milian Vogel /Sound Editing : Milian Vogel, Matias Santos /Set Design and Costumes Franz Reimer /Set design and Make-up Adriana Fiedler /Colorist Till Beckmann /Title Design Alessandra Leone/ Text inspired by: Aglaja Veteranyi, Kahlil Gibran, Adelaide Bon / „Supported by Fonds Darstellende Künste with funds from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media." 2022
About The Artist(s)
Kirsten Burger, born 1975 in Heidelberg, works as an experimental filmmaker, theatre director, author and actress in Berlin. From 1996 -1998 she studied free arts and graphics with Prof. Adolf Frohner in Vienna and interdisciplinary studies in Hamburg with Johannes Süttgen, a student of Joseph Beuys, among others. The idea of Beuys' 'expanded concept of art' and 'social sculpture' still influence her work today. Influenced by Viennese Actionism as well as by works by Grotowski and other performative and political forms of expression in public space, she became increasingly interested in theatrical interventions.
1999 - 2002 she completed her Bachelor's degree in Physical Theatre in Berlin. 2003 -2006 she worked as an actress, among others: Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Deutsche Oper, Haus der Berliner Festspiele, Berlin and at the Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich. From 2006 she was a founding member & conceptual director of the collective 'Oper Dynamo West', which staged new music theatre in the public space of Berlin's City-West. Within the collective, Burger created numerous productions of her own in public space until 2011. From 2012 onwards, Burger created theatrical interventions, experimental and essay films in various contexts and with people from a wide range of backgrounds. She won several international prizes for her cinematic work, including for her film 'Das Große Glück'. In 2022 she directed her debut feature film 'Speak to Us of' wich was planed to be a thetaer peace. The main feature of her artistic work in film is an examination along the border between reality and fiction and their overlapping. Her entire work is characterised by relating this to different forms and media of artistic expression. Since 2022 she has directed the young Rambazamba Theater Berlin, which is the most important inclusive theater in Germany. In 2023 she founded the young ensemble there, which celebrated its first premiere in 2023 with "raving" in the Humbold Forum Berlin.