PROJECT TITLE

LOCOMOTION – No time for silence

THEATER INSTALLATION AND PERFORMANCE: Premiere May 8, 2027
FOCUS: theater, expansive sound installation, international composition competition, European history of mobility and remembrance
PROJECT MANAGER AND IMPLEMENTATION: Die Stelzer – Mandl & Hauck eGbR (Theater Die Stelzer)
COOPERATION PARTNERS: dieKunstBauStelle e. V. (project support), Bahnpark Augsburg gGmbH (venue and partner)
SCIENTIFIC SUPPORT: University partners in Munich and Klagenfurt
LOCATION: Augsburg Railway Park, Historic Roundhouse
FUNDING: Kulturfonds Bayern (applied for); further partners and sponsors in preparation

WEBSITE AND DOCUMENTATION:

The website is currently being prepared.

CONTENT AND TOPICS

“LOCOMOTION – No Time for Silence” transforms the historic roundhouse of the Augsburg Railway Park into an immersive theater space. Historic locomotives become acoustic actors in an expansive sound production. The audience moves through thirteen time travel stations, each assigned to a locomotive, spanning an arc from the industrial revolution to the world wars and European unification.

With this project, Theater Die Stelzer aims to make the history of European mobility, its ruptures and connections accessible as a sensory experience. dieKunstBauStelle e. V. accompanies the project as a cooperation partner with experience in digital history mediation and remembrance culture and supports the content embedding as well as the supra-regional visibility.

PROJECT

“LOCOMOTION – No Time for Silence” is a site-specific theater production that conceives the roundhouse of the Augsburg Railway Park as a stage space and its locomotives as historical and acoustic witnesses. The roundhouse, built for the maintenance of the machines of an entire era, becomes a resonating space of European history.

Thirteen stations form the dramaturgical path. Each is assigned to a locomotive and a historical threshold: the beginning of industrial mobility, the acceleration of living environments, the wars of the 20th century, reconstruction, division and finally European unification. The machines do not speak in images, but in sounds. A 24-channel audio system distributes the production throughout the space, motion sensors react to the audience and the existing 360° tours of the railroad park are integrated into the performance via VR modules.

The tonal core is an international composition competition based on Arthur Honegger’s Pacific 231 (1923) – a work that brought the locomotive into modern concert music. The premiere is scheduled for May 8, 2027: the 104th anniversary of Honegger’s work and at the same time the day of liberation. This double dating combines the aesthetic and political dimensions of the project.

LOCOMOTION does not see itself as a museum production, but as an artistic interrogation: What stories do machines tell when they stop moving? Which movements did they enable – and which did they prevent? The production rejects nostalgic railroad romanticism and instead seeks the uncomfortable resonance space between progress, violence and reconciliation.

GOALS

The project has three objectives:

1. the artistic development of the Augsburg Railway Park as a nationally significant performance venue at the interface of industrial culture, history and contemporary stage art;
2. the combination of historical substance with contemporary composition through an international competition that produces new works for historical machines;
3. communicating the history of European mobility and remembrance in a format that reaches a broad public beyond traditional exhibitions and concert formats.

IMPLEMENTATION

1. Organization and implementation of the international composition competition based on Honegger’s Pacific 231; adjudication and selection of the works to be realized for the production.
2. Technical installation in the roundhouse: 24-channel audio system, motion sensors, integration of the existing 360° VR tours.
3. Dramaturgical development of the thirteen time travel stations in coordination with the scientific partner institutions in Munich and Klagenfurt.
4. Rehearsal phase and premiere on May 8, 2027 in the Rundhaus of the Bahnpark Augsburg, followed by a series of performances.
5. Accompanying educational program (introductions, artist talks, school cooperations) and national press work.

PLAYING LOCATION

Augsburg Railway Park, Historic Roundhouse

DATE

Premiere: May 8, 2027
Performance series: Dates will be announced in good time.

TEAM

Project idea, concept and direction: Wolfgang Hauck (Theater Die Stelzer)
Project sponsor and implementation: Die Stelzer – Mandl & Hauck eGbR
Project support and cooperation: dieKunstBauStelle e. V.
Venue and cooperation: Bahnpark Augsburg gGmbH
Scientific monitoring: Consequences

COOPERATION

The LOCOMOTION project is a cooperation between Die Stelzer – Mandl & Hauck eGbR (Theater Die Stelzer) and Bahnpark Augsburg gGmbH. dieKunstBauStelle e. V. is accompanying the project as a cooperation partner and contributes experience from supra-regional cultural and mediation projects.

Theater Die Stelzer has been directed by Wolfgang Hauck for thirty years and stands for site-specific, visually powerful theater in unusual venues. With its historic roundhouse and one of the most important collections of historic locomotives in southern Germany, the Augsburg Railway Park is a unique performance venue.

PROMOTION

Kulturfonds Bayern, Bavarian State Ministry of Science and the Arts
Further funding and partnership requests follow

PRESS

Press reports will be documented here after the first public dates.

STATUS 18.05.2026

The project is currently in the application and preparation phase. The international composition competition and the technical planning for the roundhouse are being prepared.