Calla Henkel and Max Pitegoff: Theater

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Fluentum presents THEATER, a solo exhibition by artist duo Calla Henkel and Max Pitegoff that reflects on live performance in an age of radical change. THEATER marks the beginning of their newest durational film, with the first three episodes commissioned by Fluentum and premiering there in September.

Calla Henkel and Max Pitegoff’s new film THEATER is set and shot at New Theater Hollywood in Los Angeles, the black box theater space the two artists have been operating since January 2024. Blending fiction and performance documentation, THEATER uses footage shot during rehearsals of productions staged at New Theater Hollywood to construct a narrative around a character named Kennedy, played by filmmaker Leilah Weinraub, who buys a fifty-seat theater after a car accident and subsequent cash settlement. In the film’s first three episodes premiering at Fluentum, Kennedy moves into the theater and attempts to build an ensemble. In her desire for community, she faces the cult-like power it takes to keep a group together, and the unyielding hope of transformation through fame–all haunted by strikes, ghosts, exploitation, and the maddening reality of living inside of other people’s ambitions.

For their solo exhibition at Fluentum, the artist duo connects their activities back to their former base in Berlin, with their ongoing photo series Casts (2018–) linking past and present projects and collaborators. THEATER comes directly after Henkel and Pitegoff’s last film, Paradise (2020–2022), shot over three years at TV Bar, the bar they operated in Berlin-Schöneberg. Both films run on of the unpredictable electricity of these spaces and the people who populate them, letting lived experiences guide the films’ narratives while asking broader questions about documentation, the performance of labor, and collective memory. Like Paradise, THEATER is shot on 16mm film and narrated via subtitles, unspooling somewhere between long-form poetry and photography, with a score by MK Velsorf. Episodic in form, new installments of THEATER will continue to be made as long as New Theater Hollywood continues to operate.

Curated by Dennis Brzek and Junia Thiede.