Das Frühlingsopfer /The Rite of Spring by Pina Bausch (Wuppertal Tanztheater Ensemble 1978)

Music by Igor Stravinsky
Choreography by Pina Bausch
Wuppertal Tanztheater Dancers
Solo Dancer: Malou Airaudo
The Cleveland Orchestra
Conductor Pierre Boulez
Preface by Rudolf Nureev
ZDF Production, 1978

In 1975 Pina Bausch competed with Das Frühlingsopfer (The Rite of Spring), a testing ground for many choreographers of the 20th century. Her version, which has become a cornerstone of the company's repertoire, is characterized by the absence of any reference to pagan Russia and any folkloric figurativism. In dealing with dramatic crudeness the violence of the group towards a girl destined for propitiatory sacrifice, Pina Bausch stages a true collective ritual full of emotional strength and physicality that involves the performers and the public. At the end, the Elect abandons herself to a solo made up of shocks, confusion and anger, the victim of a terror close to madness.