The Wounded German Body of Christoph Schlingensief

Christoph Schlingensief (1960-2010) was surely the most controversial and possibly the most important theatre director in Germany, after the 'Wiedervereinigung'. He made most of his performances at the Berlin Volksbühne, a theatre that managed to combine a dissident marxist spirit (post-DDR) with radical artistic innovation. Schlingensief dealt with Germany as 'wounded body' - historically and politically. This was most clearly shown in his projects with asylum seekers and ex-neonazis. The idea of the (metaphorical) wound, as it was present in Wagners 'Parsifal' Schlingensief directed at the Bayreuth Festival (2004), became all too literal when he was diagnozed with lung cancer in 2008. Since that moment Schlingensief linked his own disease with his theatrical treatments of German identity, post-colonialism etc.