Folkwang

folkwang is... choosing again and again by Alexander Vaassen

Corona has been wreaking havoc for almost three months now, even if Germany has got off lightly in international comparison. The federal and state governments are gradually ramping up again. Perhaps a little too quickly? Perhaps just in time? We shall see.

In the meantime, theater (directors) have despaired of having to produce "content" (sometimes on the orders of their cities) and of the fact that actors with their cell phone cameras in front of the woodchip wallpaper at home or the hastily (re)stocked bookshelf cannot compete with Netflix & Co. in terms of quality - especially without rehearsal time, which is one of the most significant differences (after all, six weeks long!) to fast-paced film production. Art colleges across the country tried to come up with concepts. The best possible was a constructively designed home semester or creative semester. For us acting and directing students, in our contact-heavy discipline, this meant not only limited contact, but contact-free staring at our increasingly awful laptop screens, at least swotting up on the content that does not require contact, such as creating concepts or dealing with theories.

The thoughts that come to mind! What books do I actually have on the shelf that I haven't read yet? What will the theater, heck, the whole world look like after Corona? What kind of theater do I actually want to do? What if I was graduating and it was completely unclear whether I could find jobs due to the pandemic, which is hard enough in a healthy (theater) world? What material do I do in my intermediate diploma? Why actually continue studying when a totally constructive mode is emerging that I could work in for years? On the other hand, what am I irreparably missing out on? Should I really order another four new books, plays and texts? Will the database for theater texts theatertexte.de notice that my claim to be a "freelance director" is (still) a very steep one? And how cool is it to be allowed and able to deal with the content that interests me?

Two people in a scene, one standing, the other mirrored in a pane of glass
Scene photo from "Herr Kolpert" (by David Gieselmann), semester production winter semester 2019/20 by Alexander Vaassen, taken three days before the start of contact restrictions. from left to right: Maja Lilly Dickmann (Folkwang musical student), Anna Jörgens and Pit Prager (Folkwang drama students) | Photo: Laura Thomas

Before studying directing at Folkwang, I studied acting at the "Ernst Busch" drama school in Berlin and then worked as a freelance actor for a year. I've also always written, and I came to directing by staging my own texts. Corona has given me two insights, among others: I really don't feel like acting anymore, I don't miss it at all, and how productive, quantitatively and qualitatively, you become as a writer when you have nothing better to do and writing is the only meaningful form of expression left (maybe I just go into self-imposed quarantine every ten years to "pin something down properly". Let's see if I can really shit myself like that or if a pandemic is really needed every time for this form of literary productivity, but that's just as an aside, I'm studying directing).

Don't endure, keep deciding

And then the third big realization: My God, I suffer from not being able to direct. And yes, I can do preparatory work, read and analyze plays, create concepts, blah blah blah. But the table is not the rehearsal stage! And the webcam, with which I have made a handful of desperate attempts to realize something like a rehearsal, even less so. This is actually the greatest blessing in disguise of Corona for me: what I only suspected until now, because it was only a dream but not lived everyday life, is now crystal clear: directing is the right thing to do. I want to do it. And to be able to do it, I need to know how to do it. And to know how to do it, I have to study it.

I had deliberately chosen Folkwang, I hadn't applied anywhere else. And I was very lucky that Folkwang chose me. And because I had already completed my first degree, which was not uncomplicated, I always had the feeling that after four years in Berlin I had finally understood that studying should be a partnership between student and institution and not just a relationship of dependency. In my opinion, the directing department at the Folkwang lives this. Of course, despite this certainty, at some point you get caught up in the university maelstrom and then you're stuck in it. But Corona has simply pulled you out of it and when things really pick up in September or October, or maybe even next year, Corona offers a wonderful opportunity: to make a conscious decision to study again. It's a bit, to end on a slightly pathetic note, like the opportunity to fall in love all over again.

Alexander Vaassen
Directing course (Artist Diploma)