Raimund Hoghe obituary

Choreographer, dancer, dramaturge and writer Raimund Hoghe, one of the most distinctive figures of contemporary performing arts, suddenly passed away at his home in Düsseldorf on May 14th. Hoghe was going to participate in a live conversation after showing excerpts of his pieces on the 14th and 15th as part of this year's online version of the Dance festival held in Munich every two years. 

Hoghe was born in 1949 in Wuppertal. He was working as a dramaturge in the Tanztheater Wuppertal between 1979 and 1989 when Pina Bausch began to form and mature her dance theater aesthetics. If I count only a few of the works of those years, for example "Viktor", "1980", "Bandoneon", it would be impossible not to give credit to Hoghe for he was one of the members of the creative team at the peak of Bausch's art. In addition to these three, I also want to name two pieces of Bausch, "Auf den Gebirge hat man ein Geschrei gehört" and "Two cigarettes in the dark", which include Hoghe's contribution and which I personally admire the most.

After working 10 years at Tanztheater Wuppertal, Raimund Hoghe left and founded his own company. He has regularly produced numerous works as a choreographer and dancer from that day until his death, was invited to the world famous theater and dance festivals such as Avignon, Montpellier, Paris Fall, and received Deutscher Tanzpreis, the most prestigious dance award given in Germany, in 2020.

When I did not experience Hoghe's contribution to Bausch’s aesthetics by attending one of the pieces of that period live on stage, but with the excessive curiosity triggered by the knowledge that he worked as a dramaturgy for Bausch for a period, I first watched his work at the ImPulsTanz, famous festival for contemporary dance in Vienna in 2006. I can't forget that evening. It was my first and - for now - last trip to Vienna, and the only urge of my trip was the performances that I would attend: For the first time a Sidi Larbi Cherkoui's work (L'Avant), a Bill T. Jones’ work (As I was saying) and one by Hoghe, "Young People, Old Voices".

When "Young People, Old Voices" started, the 500-seat auditorium of Akademie Theater was jam-packed. After the first half hour of the show, people started to walk out slowly. By the time the three-hour show was over, only about 30 people stayed in the hall, including my mother and me. I can say that my mother also spent the most patient three hours of her life. Although I whispered a few times, "If you want, you can go back to the hotel" in her ear, she remained.

"Young People, Old Voices" was a very difficult piece to attend. When I watched this piece I haven't yet seen live any of the Bausch’s pieces I mentioned above, so commenting now, looking back, I can see that it is very reminiscent of one of the characteristics of Bausch's early works, flexing the time. In one of its sequences, the dancers lined up at the very back of the stage moving very slowly to the apron while as if doing nothing. "Young People, Old Voices" was a piece that I could describe as "strange", melancholic, situation-oriented rather than movement-based, and containing extreme irony.

Later, when I watch one or two of Hoghe's pieces on record, I can say that my thoughts about "Young People, Old Voices" more or less could be applied to others. As a spectator, you have to engage in Hoghe's pieces, think with them, and even surrender yourself to them. In general there aren’t many moments to relax and let you breathe. They are not attractive either as music, light, stage, costume or movement design wise. Hoghe's pieces do not dazzle you as a spectacle, rather, they seem to bring his thoughts on bodies onto the stage in a very abstract and hard-approachable way. Hoghe created poetic pieces that you could mostly admire not with your heart but with your mind. I doubt that in the future his pieces will be staged by other companies for they were very unique and personal pieces, outside of the usual and well-known norms, and he was also featured as a performer in the most of them.

After "Young People, Old Voices" I did not cross paths with any of Hoghe’s pieces again. At the beginning of February last year in Düsseldorf, when I was abroad just before the pandemic broke out, I made my choice between the premiere of Hoghe's "Postcards from Vietnam" and the musical that Robert Wilson adapted from "The Jungle Book" in favor of the latter, maybe I should have decided in favour of the former…