Probably the topic was just too big to dare to approach for a long time. And strictly speaking, there are actually two very large and very complex issues. The opera house on Nuremberg’s Richard-Wagner-Platz, a splendid building from the early 20th century, urgently needs to be completely refurbished, it can still be played until the 2024/25 season, after which – according to the fire protection report – there is a risk of serious trouble with the fire police. 650 employees of the State Theater Nuremberg are employed there. And they’d like to know where they’re going to work in the near future.
So an interim construction is needed – and first of all a suitable area. On the other hand, a favorite has emerged in the last few months that was almost unthinkable in Nuremberg for a long time. Why not build an interim building on the former Nazi party rally grounds in the inner courtyard of the torso of the Nazi congress hall, on the stage of which Verdi is performed, while all the other functional rooms of the opera are integrated into the horseshoe-shaped Nazi colossus? It can be said without exaggeration that this would be a huge topic and that we should take enough time to discuss it. The only problem is that there are hardly any left, if the 650 opera houses are not to be left without a roof over their heads in the foreseeable future – and northern Bavaria’s audience without a nationwide opera house.
How can something like this come about, this sudden time pressure? See above, the topic was probably just too weighty for many. And then there were all sorts of major cultural issues on the cheek in Nuremberg: the multi-million dollar renovation of the NS Zeppelin grandstand, which is not supposed to be called renovation, but only “making sure of the footing” (coming); finally a presentable concert hall for a city of half a million (put on hold); and the hope of being chosen as the European Capital of Culture (vanished).
From the outside you can see the age of the Nuremberg Opera House. The magnificent building was erected in the early 20th century.
(Photo: Olaf Przybilla)
In the coming week, a commission should actually make a recommendation as to where the opera interim should now be: On a company site? Integrated into the trade fair? On the former Nazi party rally grounds? There are still a few days left until then, but if you talk to the initiated, you will hear a manageable amount of optimism. Provide a path now, when the debate is only just beginning – in view of the dimension of the topic? Especially since there are sums in the room that are described as dizzying, rather an understatement. For the renovation of the opera house, 500 million euros may be needed, others estimate the costs at 700 million. And the interim itself, wherever it may be, should also be difficult to get without a three-digit million sum – after all, it’s about an opera house. Taken together, the city councilor Ernesto Buholzer Sepúlveda calculates, if you play in the league of Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie, financially. Not ideal conditions for a whopper.
Especially since now that the debate has finally flared up, more and more ideas are making the rounds that seem bizarre at first glance – but would deserve at least a second look. One of them comes from the Nuremberg “Politbande”, which is committed to “promoting socio-cultural freedom, participation and sustainability”, is culturally well networked and sends a representative to the city council. For some, the gang members are intellectual dream dancers, others value them as cool young political kids with discursive aspirations. An opera in Nazi-contaminated territory? City councilor Buholzer Sepúlveda would have no problem with that. On the contrary: He and his gang advocate not just setting up an interim there, but also allowing the state theater to take root on the ex-Nazi site.
The Greens and the CSU are in favor of using the NS torso, the SPD is still hesitant
Sounds bold – others say: crazy – but has a serious background. It has not yet been clarified what exactly should be completely refurbished in the opera house. After all, “the Nazi regime brutally removed all of the original Art Nouveau ornamentation from the interior,” recalls Buholzer Sepúlveda. The question arises as to “which interior should actually be restored during a restoration”. Especially since it is already foreseeable that the costs of a major renovation could get out of hand. If the magnificent building were to be used differently – for example as a “climate and culture house” – and the state theater to be rebuilt in the south of the city, something really big could come about there together with the independent scene. Nuremberg could “prove itself to be a modern metropolis” – and possibly even save money. At least that’s what the political gang believes.
Total move? The social democrat Ulrich Blaschke is not regarded as hostile to debate, but he now considers that to be absurd. And that’s because it would sound like a “finished building of the NS torso”, believes Blaschke, himself a member of the Opera House Commission. The “impression of spatial emptiness” in the inner courtyard of the NS torso, the unfinished gigantomaniac, the stone failure of an ideology must be preserved at least in the beginning, he demands. Would that be feasible with an interim building in the middle of the NS horseshoe building? The SPD is still hesitant, while the Greens and CSU – including Mayor Marcus König and cultural advisor Julia Lehner – have already spoken out in favor of it. “We don’t want to annoy, slow down or prevent,” asserts Blaschke, but all alternatives, facts and figures – a budget, for example – would be nice to have on the table when it comes to what is probably the largest cultural building project in at least the recent history of the city.
Especially since there have long been voices to be taken seriously who fundamentally reject the construction of an opera house – whether interim or not – on the ex-Nazi site. At the “Geschichte für alle” association, for example, a bustling institute for regional history, they would have nothing against letting artists and cultural workers move into the inner buildings of the Nazi torso. After all, this would not significantly change the external face of the listed propaganda building. But to enrich the deliberately emptied inner courtyard of the torso, which like no other building on the area stands for the bankruptcy of a system, with a cultural site? The institute’s historians consider it at least questionable that OB König labels the courtyard of the torso as “desolate and neglected” and wants to fill it up with “building and content”. The obstructed space, it is said in a statement, “would destroy the cultural memorial value once and for all”.
At the moment, such arguments hardly meet with any significant response. On the contrary: in the Nuremberg newspaper Friends of a concert hall have just brought a new idea into play. They not only want an opera interim in the inner courtyard of the Nazi building, but also a concert hall appropriate to Bavaria’s second largest municipality, which the city has lacked for decades. That would be two large cultural buildings in the previous Nazi wasteland. As I said: we need a lot of time for the debate in Nuremberg.