German premier

»Searching for traces« – a father enters the room and searches for memories. He slowly draws closer. Loneliness surrounds him. Then children follow – his children? The community silently surrounds the father, a father, their father. A sarcophagus is positioned. The father gets inside and disappears after the children have taken their leave. A religiously-tinted ritual in the twilight. A theatre of gesture, the inner images and associations, beyond language.

Mysterious African stories are told during childhood, from father Stefano to father Romeo who in turn passes them along to his children. Humility – a forgotten word? Humility for our father, for the past. Only the third volume is available in the middle of life – and it turns to dust at the same moment it is read. Volumes I and II have been written, but cannot be found. The epilogue can wait. In the »Storia contemporanea dell’Africa«, the universe of Romeo Castellucci appears as if in a burning glass – a compressed variation of his large productions which have travelled around the world, presented with his own six children.

The Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio is one of the most important and radical theatre groups working in contemporary European theatre. It was founded by Romeo Castellucci, who was born in 1960 in Cesena (near Bologna), in the year 1980. He studied stage design and painting at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Bologna and combines spoken and physical theatre, music, opera, painting, imagery and new technologies. The company was already repeatedly invited to euro-scene Leipzig: »Giulio Cesare« (»Julius Caesar«, 1997), »Voyage au bout de la nuit« (»Journey to the end of the night«, 2000), »Buchettino« (»Tom thumb«, 2005) und »Hey girl!« (2007).