Feathers for Rosa

FEATHERS for ROSA

Feathers for Rosa will be premiered at The New Theatre, Dublin on 5th March 2024 at 7:30, with further performances on 6th and 7th March. The event combines painting, music, poetry, performance and film to pay tribute to this remarkable woman, Rosa Luxemburg, whose radicalism insisted on the combination of political freedom and social equality.

We are making this event as a labour of love and want to make it admission free as we feel that Luxemburg’s message of peace and international solidarity has never been so necessary to the world. However, we need to cover the costs of the technical staff of the theatre and accommodation for two for a week in Dublin. We would appreciate your support to spread this message of peace. A €50 donation will receive a beautiful swan watercolour painted on the banks of the Berlin canals, and all donations of €10 will be entered into a draw (each draw limited to 6 tickets) for one of these unique watercolours.

Rosa was murdered by the Freikorps (forerunners of the Nazis) on 15th January 1919 in Berlin, and her body was thrown into the Landwehr Canal. The canal bank is a popular route for walking, and during December 1967 the German-Jewish poet Paul Celan took this walk and composed a poem re-imagining the fate of Luxemburg and that of her murdered political ally, Karl Liebknecht. I made a series of paintings on this theme and, together with Douglas Henderson, we set this poem to music. These feature in the event along with a spoken-word performance based the writings of Luxemburg, eye-witness memories of the bombing of Berlin in WW2 and our own encounters with the traces of this in our Berlin neighbourhood.

The Landwehr Canal is also home to a large flock of swans, which I have sketched many times. They preen on the banks, leaving feathers like snow on the grass. We collected these feathers and thought of Emeline Pankhurst’s White Feather Campaign to shame men into joining the slaughter of World War 1 and the contrast with the position taken by Rosa Luxemburg, who called on all soldiers to put down their weapons. Perhaps these swans are descendants of the swans who floated over Rosa Luxemburg’s body as it lay undiscovered for four months in the canal. Their white feathers will be shared at the event - reclaimed as tokens of peace.

FEATHERS for ROSA - The New Theatre, Dublin, 5th, 6th, 7th March 2024 - 19:30

all welcome — safe space — wheelchair accessible — free entry

https://soundcloud.com/feathersforrosa/du-liegst-paul-celan?utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing