Li­gia Le­wis: I’M NOT HE­RE FORRRRRR… — Cho­reo­gra­phy as a po­li­ti­cal state­ment at the Gro­pi­us Bau

The Gro­pi­us Bau pres­ents I’M NOT HE­RE FORRRRRR…, the lar­gest so­lo ex­hi­bi­ti­on to date by in­ter­na­tio­nal­ly re­now­ned ar­tist and cho­reo­grapher Li­gia Le­wis. Le­wis has be­en li­ving and working in Ber­lin sin­ce 2013 and has de­ve­lo­ped a uni­que cho­reo­gra­phic prac­ti­ce that com­bi­nes per­for­mance, live in­stal­la­ti­on and film. Her works are un­ders­tood as a mo­ve­ment of ide­as th­rough bo­dies — me­ti­cu­lous­ly de­si­gned, staged and at the sa­me time as a po­li­ti­cal act against ra­cist sys­tems of re­pre­sen­ta­ti­on and the era­su­re of Black voices. The ex­hi­bi­ti­on pres­ents new and exis­ting works that can be seen on the ground flo­or and in the im­pres­si­ve atri­um of the Gro­pi­us Bau.

The fo­cus is on the new work Way­ward Chant, con­cei­ved espe­ci­al­ly for the Licht­hof, which will de­ve­lop dy­na­mi­cal­ly over the cour­se of the ex­hi­bi­ti­on and cul­mi­na­te in two full-length per­for­man­ces on 28 and 29 No­vem­ber. In her in­ter­di­sci­pli­na­ry works, Li­gia Le­wis deals in­ten­si­ve­ly wi­th the­mes such as race, gen­der, vio­lence and re­sis­tance and ex­ami­nes how the­se so­cial dy­na­mics con­ti­nue to shape our pre­sent. Wi­th her com­pre­hen­si­ve ar­tis­tic prac­ti­ce, Le­wis is one of the most im­portant prot­ago­nists of a re­o­ri­en­ta­ti­on of per­for­mance in the con­text of the vi­su­al arts and is the Ber­li­ner Fest­spie­le’s Ar­tist in Fo­cus in 2025. No­ra-Swant­je Al­mes and Alex­an­dra Phil­ip­povs­ka­ya are re­spon­si­ble for the cu­ra­to­ri­al su­per­vi­si­on.