5 Days In May: DAY 2

16.05.2024 / 19:00 – 22:00
With Elaine Mitchener

and Rabih Beaini, Nhã Thuyên, David Grundy, Zora Steiner, Selam Tadese, Mathias Zeiske & Sara-Hiruth Zewde

Reading of “She Talks To Beethoven” by Adrienne Kennendy with Selam Tadese + Sara-Hiruth Zewde, music by Rabih Beaini
Conversation with Nhã Thuyên, David Grundy, Zora Steiner, moderated by Mathias Zeiske

The second evening of Elaine Mitchener’s series at daadgalerie is connecting to her deep interest in and passion for literature. She will lead a discussion on surrealism in black avantgarde literature, including a reading of Adrienne Kennedy’s  “She Talks to Beethoven” with Sara Zewde and Selam Tadese. The conversation between Nhã Thuyên (literature fellow 2023-24), David Grundy & Zora Steiner will be moderated by Mathias Zeiske (head of literature + film, DAAD Artists-in-Berlin Program). The evening will be accompanied by live music from Rabih Beaini (Morphine Raum).

David Grundy is a poet and scholar. He is the author of the critical books A Black Arts Poetry Machine: Amiri Baraka and the Umbra Poets (Bloomsbury, 2019) and Never by Itself Alone: Queer Poetry in Boston and San Francisco, 1944–Present (Oxford University Press, 2024); A True Account (The 87 Press, 2023), a book of poetry; and Present Continuous (Pamenar Press, 2022), a book of lyric essays; and co-editor, with Lauri Scheyer, of Selected Poems of Calvin C. Hernton (Wesleyan University Press, 2023). He is currently writing a book on free jazz, Survival Music, and a second manuscript on music, Ensembles. He co-runs the small press Materials/Materialien.

Zora Steiner (*1992) is currently completing her Master’s degree in Japanese Art History in the ‚Art History in a Global Context‘ programme at the Freie Universität Berlin. Growing up between Florida, Jamaica, and Germany, her parents allowed her to leave home at 14 when she decided to move to Berlin on her own. Steiner is a trained librarian and was recently a bookstore manager. Her research focuses on ancient and pre-modern sacred and residential Japanese architecture and garden design, which she examines within an aesthetic and philosophical framework. Motivated by her interests in the peripheral, Steiner is keen on explorations of emptiness, nothingness, interstices, the void, the presence of absence, and space.

Selam Tadese grew up in Ulm, Baden-Württemberg, and has lived in Berlin since 2005. After training as an actor at the European Theater Institute Berlin, he appeared at the Clingenburg Festival as Iago in Shakespeare’s “Othello”, for which he received the Audience Award. This was followed by theater productions directed by Friedo Solter, Rafael Kohn and Andree Solvik, in whose production of Strindberg’s “Fräulein Julie” he appeared as Jean. Selam Tadese has also appeared in numerous film and television productions, including “Wetlands” by David Wnendt. He has also acted in films directed by Tim Trageser, Adolfo Kolmerer, Detlev Buck, Cüneyt Kaya, Maria von Heland, Hanna Maria Heidrich and Alex Eslam. He has starred in international series productions such as “Souls” and “Helgoland 513”, directed by Robert Schwentke, as well as the HBO pilot “Mogadishu, Minnesota”. The latter was directed by Kathryn Bigelow (“The Hurt Locker”, “Detroit”) and produced by Carolyn Strauss (“Game of Thrones”, “Chernobyl”). In December 2023, the final cut was made for the ZDF series production “KraNK”, in which he also plays a leading role. In Amanda Wilkins’ “The Bridgetower Sonata”, Selam Tadese is appearing on stage at Schauspiel Leipzig for the first time.

Sara-Hiruth Zewde is a German-Ethiopian actress and artist. She studied acting at the European Theater Institute Berlin and is currently studying for a Master’s degree in Art in Context at the UdK Berlin’s Faculty of Fine Arts. The starting point for her work is her own experience as a woman in urban space (Berlin-Addis Ababa). She develops performances from an Afro-German perspective, in which she confronts German-German history and navigates colonial continuities (Your’re leaving the save sector, UdK 2019). Her works are created with the means of biographical theater and examine the interaction of sculpture and performance (Talking Monuments, Tränenpalast, 2017, ) She continues the family tradition of working in clay in ceramics and porcelain to create connecting and healing experiences beyond identity attributions (Somatic Clay-Ground, Lecture-Performance 2023, Bauhaus Reuse Berlin This-is-not-a-test Residency).
In addition to various theater works at the theater ( Ballhaus Naunynstrasse, Gorki Theater Berlin, Haus der Berliner Festspiele, Foreign Affairs Festival, Bühne für Menschenrechte), she also acts in film and television (Wut auf Kuba, 2022, directed by Naira Cavero Orihuel) and works as a voice-over artist for dubbing and audiobooks. She performed with the prison theater AufBruch for two seasons (including the role of Maria in Maria und Elisabeth, 2011 directed by Peter Atanassow) and is a long-standing ensemble member of Wort- und Herzschlag (Die Mittelmeer Monologe, Die Klima Monologe, directed by Michael Ruf, Heimathafen Berlin)

daadgalerie
Free admission

Photo: Adrienne Kennedy; Credit: Jack Robinson / Getty Images