THEATRE - ARCHITECTURE - KNOWLEDGE. Epistemic Continuities and Ruptures in Light of the Theatre Architecture Collection at the Technical University of Berlin

• Applicants: Professor Dr. Jan Lazardzig; Professorin Dr.-Ing. Bri Newesely; Professorin Dr. Kerstin Wittmann-Englert
• Subject Area: Theatre and Media Studies ; Art History
• Term: since 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 447276034

Adopting multiple perspectives from the disciplines of art history, engineering design and theatre studies, the project is dedicated to the epistemic and archival research that is conducted in the Theatre Architecture Collection of the Museum of Architecture at the Technische Universität Berlin. Over 5’000 sources (including photographs, drawings, handwritten notes and publications), documenting almost 500 theatres, provide an overview of the locations and condition of these 20th-century Central European cultural buildings. Three central parts of these holdings, dating from the 1920s to the 1980s, are being studied with regard both to the accumulated architectural and technical knowledge that they contain, as well as to the ways in which this expertise has been produced, applied and disseminated, both individually and institutionally. The starting point of the project is the observation that architectural projects and technical innovations in theatre design often evidence a relationship to the political, cultural and artistic ruptures of the twentieth-century. The following hypothesis will however be tested: Despite the effects of such ruptures, epistemic continuities have been equally decisive in determining how new theatres are designed and realised. Accordingly, the project is situated at the intersection of two research perspectives that need to be systematically related to one another. Firstly, there is the history of the architecture and technology of the theatre and its mediation and dissemination; secondly, the question as to the social, political and artistic function of theatre architecture. The main research questions are: How is the understanding of theatre architecture disseminated, and through which personal and institutional networks? How is such knowledge transformed through practices of collecting, curating and mediating? How does its social, political and aesthetic function and legitimation change in the course of the 20th century? The project is divided into three interdisciplinary sections which focus on the dissemination of knowledge and are related to the three central parts of the collection: Section 1, ‘Documentation’, examines the epistemic implications of architectural photography, taking as its source the National Socialist publication ‘Das Deutsche Theater’ (unpublished). Section 2, ‘Standardisation’, is dedicated to the ways in which the technician Friedrich Kranich documented and standardised the technology of theatre and stage design, in the context of his manual ‘Theatertechnik der Gegenwart’. Section 3, ‘Institutionalisation’ examines the epistemic foundations of the theory of theatre architecture in post-war Modernism, drawing on the estate of the architect and teacher Gerhard Graubner and the collection of the Institute of Theatre Architecture at the TU Berlin. The project is intended to contribute to current discourse on the preservation of the cultural heritage of German theatre architecture.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Co-Investigator: Dr. Hans-Dieter Nägelke