"You should not make a picture. For an image restricts, limits, captures what should remain unlimited and unimaginable," says a choral piece by Arnold Schoenberg. Commissioned by the Wiener Festwochen, the visual artist Ulla von Brandenburg has joined forces with actors, the Arnold Schoenberg Choir and musicians from the Klangforum Wien seven pieces for voice by the exceptional composer in the Art Nouveau Theater am Steinhof. A synaesthetic journey through architecture, colors and moods. A choir - many voices, one body - makes the sounds three-dimensional, the music material. Well versed in cultural history, yet playfully committed to the momentary, Ulla von Brandenburg initiates a Gesamtkunstwerk in the coming together of many different voices. There is a hint of utopian forms of community. Because: "Art is not about producing mere beauty, but about raising questions, exacerbating disharmony and complexity."
The production will be performed again on May 17, May 18 and May 19, 2022.
Text: Wiener Festwochen
Photo: Ulla von Brandenburg