Festival “Kuckuck” shows theater productions for the very youngest. – Munich

According to Andrea Gronemeyer, director of Schauburg, “feeding but not overfeeding” audiences in the pre-linguistic stage is the declared aim of “Kuckuck”, the theater festival for beginners. “You can’t do as much as a Schauburg as there is demand for the offer for the very youngest in Munich,” she says at the presentation of this year’s festival program in the evangelical family educational center Elly Heuss Knapp (“Elly”). Accordingly, the tickets for the eight invited productions of “Kuckuck” are already in demand, with which the very youngest can go on a world discovery tour from February 24th to March 6th in the three venues of the organizers Schauburg, Elly and Puppentheaterforum of the Stadtmuseum.

Among them were mainly groups from France and Denmark. “They’ve simply been the pioneers of this theater for 40 years,” says Gronemeyer. Whereby it is not primarily about straight theatre, but music, dance and object theatre. In other words, art forms that first appeal to the senses such as sight and hearing do not yet tell a continuous story.

The famous Danish group Aaben Dans with their piece “What is that?” I’ve been chasing them for years, says Gronemeyer. But they are constantly on the move around the world and therefore difficult to get. But now they are guests in Munich, first discovering their bodies, then the space around them. The piece is suitable for toddlers from 6 months, “but the two actors are such great dancers that I promise you that it will also be an aesthetic experience for adults”.

Hands and feet stick out of a small house

The pantomime “Hermit” (in German “hermit”) by the Dutch company Simone de Jong deals with the relationship between inside and outside. First you only see the hands, then the feet sticking out of a small square house. “They belong to a hermit who is more afraid of the children than they are of him,” says Gronemeyer. Finally, a tall, long man appears, “who makes you wonder how he even fit into the box,” she says with a smile. An exciting balancing act about isolation and the desire to go out and approach others.

The Swiss actor and painter Cedric Pintarelli brings color into play with “Freche Flache”: Before the eyes of the audience he creates works of art with paint buckets, brushes and atomizers, in which the children are allowed to participate. In order to counteract a “certain reluctance when it comes to theater art with the very young”, there is a specialist day for nursery and kindergarten managers in the Schauburg: Based on the play “What is that?” Methods are taught to playfully prepare children for the theatrical experience. Gronemeyer sees the mobile performances in day care centers and in front of kindergarten groups in her house as a central task anyway. “There are still all the chances that will only be blocked later.” Because in the freely sold family performances later only the children whose parents culture is important would come.

Creates works of art in front of the eyes of the little viewers with paint buckets, brushes and surfaces: Swiss actor and painter Cedric Pintarelli.

(Photo: Christian Kleiner)

No stage experience, but at least the willingness to move, you should bring to the workshop of the French artist Katerini Antonakaki for educators and artists in the city museum. It is based on her object theater “Here and There”, with which the festival opens on February 24 in the City Museum. In it, as a mysterious woman, she invites you to daydream in an empty house, which turns out to be a small laboratory of objects, images and sounds.

with “Poor Donkey Alf” there is something like a little story to be experienced in the same place, for children between four and eight years of age. “The sense of justice or injustice plays a very important role for children,” says Eva Berger, who represents the puppet theater forum at the festival. This is probably what happened to the actress Heidrun Warmuth. “She loved the picture book so much as a child that later she really wanted to play it on stage,” explains Berger.

Kuckuck – Theater Festival for Beginners, February 24th to March 6th, Schauburg, Ev. Elly Heuss-Knapp family education center, city museum, all dates at kuckuckfestival.com

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