A White Leaf

about the piece

A White Leaf is a piece about Bartleby, that cryptic figure from Melville’s novella, which has been subjected to a flood of interpretive attempts for generations. At the beginning of the development of this piece, there is an anecdote: after Winkler suggested to dancer and choreographer Günther Wilhelm that he dance the role of Bartleby, it emerged that in his youth, Wilhelm was a Bavarian champion in shorthand and was on the verge of a career as a clerk in the Bavarian parliament, but he chose instead to pursue dance. The famous sentence, “I would prefer not to,” takes on a special biographical twist here, and thus there is probably no one who brings as much understanding for this character as G. Wilhelm. The solo is thus, in a sense, an em of this character, conceived and choreographed from the perspective of writing. Writing is used as a bridge between character and choreography because it is one of the most suitable metaphors for speaking about dance as a body inscribing itself in space. Any stylization of Bartleby as a “hero of postmodernity” is avoided, and even a “thinning out” does not occur, for the path to nothingness is deafening. It is rather a dance, executed as hardcore calligraphy, about the “Scrivener who no longer writes” who becomes his “own white sheet” and ultimately dies because the walls can be as soft as cotton.

videos

credits

Choreography: Christoph Winkler | With: Günther Wilhelm | Stage design: Alexander Schellow, Charlotte Kaiser | Music: Ekkehard Ehlers, Devendra Banhart | Lighting: André Schulz | Production Management: Barbara Friedrich

Production: Christoph Winkler, Sophiensaele and TANZTAGE BERLIN, supported by the Senate Department for Science, Research and Culture and the Performing Arts Fund. With the friendly support of Tanzfabrik Berlin

reviews

[...]With his half-hour choreography, Bartleby - A White Sheet, Winkler succeeds in creating a compelling portrait of a man who perishes within the confines of the prison he has constructed for himself. Günther Wilhelm, whose dancing prowess is pivotal to the piece's success, bursts onto the stage dressed in black, steps onto a small platform, collapses to the floor, and rolls out of the world he seeks to appropriate through writing. He then explores its boundaries with articulate, nimble, and precisely placed movements, as if his body were inscribing itself into the space with every twist and turn. Tanzjournal

[...]The first part is dedicated to Melville's character Bartleby […] Dancer Wilhelm Groener portrays him in a brittle manner, by relinquishing the body's resistances that keep him standing upright. Die Tageszeitung