LiteraTurm 2016

How can film editing influence literature? How can musical techniques be applied to literature? And what happens when text and dance collide? The biennial festival LiteraTurm 2016 was based on the motto “The Borderless Text” which refered to the crossing of borders through the interweave and interaction between literature and other art forms. It also played on the aesthetic blurring of boundaries which the written word makes possible: experiments with sounds, tones, digital media and poetry, which create entirely new hybrid forms. The programme featured performances, films, an exhibition, reading concert, live radio play, discussions and numerous readings.

The opening event and one of the main highlights of the festival, staged in the Kaisersaal at the Römer, was a reading concert by the writers Katharina Hacker and Monika Rinck in collaboration with musical dramaturge Hermann Kretzschmar from the Ensemble Modern. The Autoteatro performance “The Quiet Volume” invited listeners to react to whispered and written communication, and become part of an interactive performance in the reading room of the German National Library. The Cooperativa Maura Morales has created a dance choreography based on the novel Blindness by José Saramago. Additional highlights included events with Ann Cotten, Maxim Biller, Thea Dorn, Herta Müller, Oskar Roehler, Roland Schimmelpfennig, Thomas von Steinaecker, Nis-Momme Stockmann and Guntram Versper.

LiteraTurm was cooperating with the Birmingham Literature Festival for the first time this year. The events took place in Frankfurt, Darmstadt, Wiesbaden and other venues around the region.

Artistic director: Sonja Vandenrath
Artists: Literature / Film: Oskar Roehler, Literature / Drama / Radio plays: Frank Witzel, Armin Petras, Leonhard Koppelmann, Literature / Dance: Martina Hefter, The James Cousins Company (GB), Performance: Ant Hampton and Tim Etchell (GB), Music / Literature: Ensemble Modern, Lautpoesie: Michael Lentz, Jaap Blonk (NL) Nora Gomringer, Literature / Fine Arts: Martin Mosebach, Literature / Pop music: Thomas Meinecke, Ulrich Peltzer, Stefan Twardoch (PL), Jakob Hein