Bausch’s legacy of dance lives on
Son teams up with African troupe for touring production of her famous ‘Rite’
In 2009, just five days after receiving a cancer diagnosis, the world-renowned German choreographer Pina Bausch died. She left behind an electrifying body of work that changed dance forever, and just one heir: her son Salomon Bausch.
At the time of her death, she had been working with acclaimed director Wim Wenders on a film, which her company completed in tribute. As a result, the world has the Oscar-nominated documentary “Pina” as a film record of her dances’ raw brilliance. But Pina Bausch’s work in live performance is largely continued by her son, who quickly established the Pina Bausch Foundation as a separate entity from her company, Tanztheater Wuppertal. On Feb. 16, her work arrives at UC Berkeley’s Cal Performances with the 1975 version of Stravinsky’s “The Rite of Spring.”
One of her most unforgettable and famous dances, it features more than 30 dancers moving with sometimes frightening force across a stage covered in dirt. For this special touring production, Salomon Bausch and the British theater Sadler’s Wells worked with choreographer Germaine Acogny and her dance school, the Ecole des Sables, located outside Dakar, Senegal, to assemble a cast from 14 African countries. Acogny also collaborated on a new duet with longtime Pina Bausch dancer Malou Airaudo, “Common Ground[s],” which opens the show.
Salomon Bausch will be in the audience at Zellerbach Hall for these performances. The Chronicle spoke to him via video call from his office in Wuppertal, Germany.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: Your mother’s work rouses an intense mix of feelings.
How was it for you to see her work as a young child? Did it feel big, exciting, scary?
A: I just grew up with it, so I never had that “wow” moment where I saw it for the first time like people who see it as adults do.
Q: How would you describe your mother as a person?
A: She had great humor, and I think she was very courageous with trusting herself and what she was looking for. I think that’s the most difficult thing, to keep searching and not settle for an easy answer to a question.
Q: When she died (at age 68), you were 27 years old and had just finished law school. That's quite young to take on a big legacy.
A: I had a responsibility to do something. And also, Pina and I had already been talking about the idea of creating a foundation, not necessarily for when she would be not with us anymore, but for a phase where she would not be active anymore as an artist. We didn’t expect that it would be something urgent.
Q: “The Rite of Spring” has been danced not only by your mother's company, but the Paris Opera Ballet, the English National
Ballet and others. How did you decide to assemble a whole new group of dancers to perform it?
A: Our rehearsal directors and I were interested in finding a group that was 100% committed to this piece. And we also run the Pina Bausch Fellowship for Dance and Choreography, where people from all over the world apply to work with another artist for up to six months. We were seeing many, many applications connected to the Ecole des Sables, and I realized how important this school is to dance all over the world, not just Africa.
Also, I had long wanted to meet Germaine Acogny. I asked (choreographer) Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker if she could introduce us, and as it happened, Germaine was in Brussels, so I met her the next day. We ended up with dancers of such diverse backgrounds — some are trained in contemporary
African dance, some in hiphop and street dance, some in ballet or Western training.
Q: Back in Germany, the company your mother headed has run through five different new artistic directors since 2009. How has it been for you to watch all that change and uncertainty in such a small amount of time?
A: I mean, I’m happy that the company is still existing. When I established the foundation, I wasn’t thinking I would count on the company existing 10 years later. It’s a huge amount of change, and it’s difficult for everybody, but I think it’s very important now to have new artistic energy there and other kinds of works.
Q: How is it going with the company's new building? It's budgeted at a cost of 58.4 million euros (approximately $63.3 million).
A: There was a big international call for architectural proposals, and it was just recently decided to go with Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s plan. I think it will take a couple years before they build it, but the foundation will have offices there, and I am looking forward to this.
Q: As you look forward to future foundation projects, do you have a favorite among your mother's dances?
A: It’s called “1980.” The whole stage is covered with lawn, real grass. So when you enter the theater, you have the smell of grass, which you don’t expect. And I have very strong memories of being in the theaters with the smell of grass, and every time I see this piece and smell it, the memories come back.