Villa Aurora Events Archive
October 2015
Travel Prologue
Villa Aurora (520 Paseo Miramar, Los Angeles, CA 90272)
Information
In the 1930s, at the at the height of the Stalinist terror and the Great Depression, writer duo Ilya Ilf and Yevgeny Petrov were sent to America on behalf of the Russian newspaper Pravda. Under the title »Das eingeschossige Amerika« (literally, Single-Storied America; translated as Little Golden America), the two satirists’ travelogue is an independent minded, fascinating combination of words and pictures that reflects the tension between the USSR and the USA during the emergence of fascism in Europe.
Seventy years later, their steps are recounted by writer Felicitas Hoppe—together with visual artists Alexej Meschtschanow and Jana Müller, whom she met at the Villa Aurora. »Das eingeschossige Amerika«, published in German in 2011, by the Andere Bibliothek, with a foreword by Hoppe, shows the Russian duo’s original route and the traveling artists’ reexamination of the East-West relationship—now in light of current political developments.
Participants
Felicitas Hoppe (*1960, Hameln) is a writer living in Berlin. She is the author of Picknick der Friseure (1996), Pigafetta (1999), Paradiese, Übersee (2003), Verbrecher und Versager (2004), and Johanna (2006), among others, including Sieben Schätze and Abenteuer — Was ist das, two of her lectures on poetics. In 2011 Hoppe reinterpreted Grünes Ei mit Speck, a translation of texts by American children’s author Dr. Seuss. Her »dream biography« Hoppe, was published in 2012. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the aspekte Literature Prize (1996) and the Georg Büchner Prize (2012). Since 2007 she has been a member of the Deutschen Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung. Felicitas Hoppe was a Villa Aurora fellow in 2012.
Jana Müller (*1977, Halle/Saale) lives and works in Berlin. She studied photography at the Academy of Visual Arts (HGB) in Leipzig with Timm Rautert . In her work, Jana Müller explores the concepts of memory and story-telling as well as cinematic topics. She met Felicitas Hoppe as a fellow at the Villa Aurora in 2012.
Alexej Meschtschanow (*1973 in Kiev, Ukraine) to Russian parents, moved to Leipzig in 1984. After completing his high school degree at a school for children of Soviet officers stationed in East Germany, he gained various professional experiences. He finished his studies of the art of painting at the Academy of Visual Arts (HGB) in Leipzig in 1997 and received his Master of Fine Arts with Timm Rautert in 2008. Alexej met Felicitas Hoppe as a fellow at the Villa Aurora in 2012. He lives and works in Berlin.
Professor Dr. Ulrike Rainer, born in Vienna, has been a professor for German Language and Literature Studies and Comparative Literature at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire for thirty years. Ulrike Rainer is a genuine world traveler who speaks multiple languages. Aside from teaching and traveling she has written many essays about literature and about the cultural history of the US.
Partner
Copresented with Goethe-Institut Los Angeles
ECLECTIC SALON #9
Villa Aurora (520 Paseo Miramar, Los Angeles, CA 90272)
Information
Music/Words is an interdisciplinary live performance series exploring connections between poetry and music.
Arnold Schoenberg’s Opus 1 and Brahms’ Sonata # 3 op. 5 in f minor will be on the program of ECLECTIC SALON # 9.
Movements of the Sonata will be alternating with readings of Brecht’s poetry, some of which were created during his years in exile in Santa Monica.
Schoenberg and Brecht were frequent guests at Villa Aurora, as were other intellectuels and artists of the time.
Participants
Ukrainian-born Inna Faliks has established herself as one of the most passionately committed, exciting and poetic artists of her generation. After her debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, she has performed on many of the world’s great stages, with numerous orchestras, in solo appearances, and with conductors such as Leonard Slatkin and Keith Lockhart.
She was the winner of many prestigious competitions, including the International Pro Musicis Award 2005. Inna is Associate Professor for piano at UCLA. She is also the founder and curator of Music/Words – www.musicwordsnyc.com
Eric Braeden is a Film, Television, Emmy and People’s Choice Award winner and arguably the most popular actor in a day time series, watched internationally by huge audiences.
Author, actor, director Louis Fantasia is DEAN OF THE FACULTY AND CHAIR OF LIBERAL ARTS AND SCIENCES AT THE NEW YORK FILM ACADEMY’S LOS ANGELES CAMPUS and director of "Shakespeare at the Huntington" at the Huntington Library. He has directed more than 150 plays and operas worldwide, including "THE LITTLE THREEPENNY CAFÉ" – SONGS AND POEMS OF BERTOLT BRECHT.
was weißt du schon von prärie
Literarisches Colloquium Berlin (Am Sandwerder 5, 14109 Berlin)
Information
Book launch: Daniela Seel & opening of the exhibition „California State Route 152, April 2015“ – photos by Mathilde Bonnefoy
"What do I know about 'prairie', as long as I have never experienced it. Where does my notion of prairie come from, and how does it inform my reality? How does fiction influence my every day life, shaping my thinking, use of language and actions. How are tales of landscapes applied to legitimize power structures and exploitation, the fanning of 'angst', the praise of magnitude and heroism? Which artistic and linguistic strategies are there to counteract that trend?"
These are questions Daniela Seel tried to answer during her stay at Villa Aurora in Los Angeles leading up to her new book of poetry "what do you know of prairie". Also staying at Villa Aurora was editor and director Mathilde Bonnefoy, who was producing a range of photographic works under the title "California State Route 152, May 2015". now on view at the Literary Colloquium. Mathilde Bonnefoy has worked with an array of filmmakers, such as Tom Tykwer and Wim Wenders. In 2014 she edited and coproduced the Oscar-winning documentary "Citizenfour" directed by Laura Poitras. On October 19 Daniela Seel and Mathilde Bonnefoy will talk about their new works and their Californian experience.
Partner
A cooperation of Literarisches Colloquiums Berlin and Villa Aurora.
Welcoming Reception. Meet the Fellows | Fall 2015
Villa Aurora (520 Paseo Miramar, Los Angeles, CA 90272)
Participants
Born 1970 in Germany, Edward Berger graduated in directing from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts in 1994. Both his work in film and television has earned him praise. JACK, Edward Bergers latest film, won the German Film Award in Silver for Best Picture. The 8-part television series DEUTSCHLAND '83 recently premiered to rave reviews on Sundance TV as the first German television show ever to air in the US.
Edward will read the treatment that he and co-fellow Nele Mueller-Stoefen devlop during their first weeks at Villa Aurora. Film clips and photos will broaden the theme of their new film.
Yutaka Makino was born in Tochigi, Japan in 1976. Makino studied earth sciences, computer music and visual arts in Japan, Europe and the US. His performances and installations provide visually and acoustically conditioned environments that make different modes of perception tangible and provoke reflection on the modes of perception.
On 10/29 Yutaka will talk about his upcoming show at BOLD Room L.A. on 11/13/2015.
Eoghan McTigue was born in Galway (Irland) in 1969. He studied visual arts in Belfast followed by his master studies in architecture and visual arts at the Institute of Art & Design (K.I.A.D.) in Canterbury. Since 1995 his work has been shown in numerous international solo and group exhibitions.
Susan Philipsz was born 1965 in Glasgow. She completed a BA in Fine Arts at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art, Dundee and an MA in Fine Art at The University of Ulster, Belfast. In 2000 she was awarded the P.S.1 studio residency programme and in 2001 she took up residency at Kunst-Werke e.V. artist residency programme in Berlin where she has lived since. In 2010 she won the Turner Prize and in 2014 she was awarded an Order of the Britsh Empire.
On 10/29 they will present a film documenting recent work with the emigree composer Hanns Eisler. It was Eisler's tale of flight from Germany in the 30's and his subsequent deportation from the United States by the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1948 that they found particularly interesting. They will also present some current research and plans for exhibitions at the Duveen Galleries Tate Britain, London (November 2015) and Hirschhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington (January 2016) and at Kunsthaus Bregenz, Austria (January 2016).
Jan Wagner was born in Hamburg in 1971. He studied English and American studies in Hamburg and Dublin and graduated in Berlin. Since the publication of his first poetry collection Probebohrung im Himmel at Berlin Verlag in 2001, Wagner has been working as a freelance poet, translator and literary critic.
On 10/29 Jan will read a selection of poems titled 'Self-Portrait With a Swarm of Bees' translated into English by Iain Galbraith (GB) and David Keplinger (USA).