was founded in 2010 in Berlin by the puppeteer-punk-rock artists Anna Menzel and Ivana Sajevic. Their first show “Pieps! Du kleiner Vogel” was rewarded with the First Prize of the Jury at the 100°-Festival in Berlin. Loaded with money and fame they did what had to be done: a theatre piece on the libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi. The night of the premier of “King of the Kings” at the Sophiensaele Berlin happened to be the first day of the Libyan revolution. Since then Annemie Twardawa and Nils Zapfe have been permanent members of the group. The show successfully went on tour, as did numerous subsequent Lovefuckers performances. Since 2020, funded by the Bundeskulturstiftung, they have been researching different performative “forms of resistence” and realizing them on stage. Starting in 2022, they start research on subjectivities of truth, funded by a two year long Basisförderung from the Berlin senate. LOVEFUCKERS are well-known for their unique way of combining music, video, puppets, performance and elements of documentary. They have played in concert halls and strip clubs as well as in theatres and at art festivals. LOVEFUCKERS follow a simple goal: to put some glamour on dirt and shit and to search for love where everything seems to be sick.
The Return of Ishtar
*another world is possible*
premiere: 24.9.2020
Every heart is a time bomb.
The world lies in a deep sleep and only some individuals awake and shape society after their wishes. History as we know it can be rewritten, reexperienced, and transformed. The newly awakened can experiment in a space without time and limits. Quietly, without anybody noticing, SHE creeps in. SHE, the queen of the apocalypse: ISHTAR. Long before we were born there was a goddess in the holy city of Uruk. People say SHE was the queen of the skies, the falcon of all gods and she had many different appearances. SHE could appear as a man or a woman. She united all contradictions. People gave her many names, one of them was ISHTAR. Today her meaning is forgotten but SHE still is an inspiration for new gender designs. We go on a radical time travel and design future scenarios in which we try to bring every possible alternative to life .
Duration: 65 minutes (no intermission)
Age : 14+
show at theater junge generation Dresden
Concept, Performance: Anna Menzel, Ivana Sajević, Annemie Twardawa
Director, Choreography: Corinne Eckenstein
Set Design, Costumes, Puppets: Birgit Kellner, Christian Schlechter (Spitzwegerich)
Puppets: Ivana Sajević, Annemie Twardawa
Music: Manfred Engelmayr Light
Design: Hannes Röbisch
Assistant Director: Sophie Freimüller
Production: Dirk Neldner, Josefine Winkler
Assistant for stage/set design: Felix Huber
Tailoring: Brigitte Moscon
Internship: David Gamel
A cooperation between Lovefuckers (Germany) & Dschungel Wien (Austria) & tjg. theater junge generation Dresden (Germany) – sponsored by Fonds Doppelpass of The German Federal Cultural Foundation
The curse – days of separation
27.07.-22.08.2020
an artist research residency
realized by
flausen+
A four week long theatre research residency about why menstruation still is a taboo in patriarchiacal society. Made possible by the Flausen + Netzwerk and the theater neben dem Turm in Marburg.
FORMS OF RESISTANCE
EXPLICITLY YOUNG
YEEHAW!!! good news: we got the Doppelpass from the Kulturstiftung des Bundes!! Together with the theatre young generation tjg – Dresden and the Dschungel Wien we’re going to research and realize Forms of Resistance, by explicitly working with teenagers. We are going to create two substantial performances: The Return of Ishtar, a reanimation of a powerful myth with a variety of means, and way out!, an interactive theatrical escape room. We can’t wait to get to work! love .. lovefuckers
Army of Lovefuckers
©Dorit Günter
Premiere 26.5.2017, Sophiensaele Berlin
Join the Army of Lovefuckers! We are arming ourselves – inside and out. The theater is our boot camp. Packed with explosives, with dolls and projections we are following the trails of the female warrior in the fight for endless freedom and absolute strength. Fearless our army goes into battle – with their own strategies and weapons. Risk your life, kill for love, annihilate resistance – performance as the continuation of politics, just with different methods. To all warriors lost: it is time to rise up!
PERFORMANCE, PUPPETS Annemie Twardawa
DIRECTOR Ivana Sajevic, Anna Menzel
DRAMATURGY Jan Deck
STAGE DESIGN, PUPPETS Jana Barthel
MUSIC Stephanie Krah
VIDEO ARTIST Suna Blum
A production by Lovefuckers in coproduction mit SOPHIENSÆLE. Funded by the Senate Department for Culture and Europe.
SILVER SEX
Premiere: 19.5.2016
©Christian Marquardt
Society is getting older but sex remains young? In the media we are bombarded with images of fooling around, masturbation and sex, while failure and aversion are quickly cured by pills. Lovefuckers have interviewed the blue-hairs: what is sex like after seventy? And what exactly awaits us later on? Do we completely do away with the sexes or do we indulge in cybersex? A journey into the unknown future with dolls, pop and projections.
CONCEPT, PERFORMANCE Ivana Sajević, Nils Zapfe
FINAL DIRECTION Sebastian Martin
EQUIPMENT, DOLLS Rita Hausmann, Virginia Reil
MUSIC Leo Auri
LIGHT DESIGN Sebastian König
Produced by Lovefuckers in co-production with SOPHIENSÆLE. Funded by the Governing Mayor of Berlin – Senate Chancellery – Cultural Affairs. Friendly supported by HfS „Ernst Busch“, Abteilung Puppenspielkunst Berlin, Puppentheater Halle, Xposed Film Festival Berlin, Andreas Martini, Magda Lena Schlott, Dietrich Kuhlbrodt und Hedy Fuchs-Waldherr.
SPAM – click.slap.stick.yeah.
©Gerhard Ludwig
Premiere: 9.4.2015
Honesty is such a lonely word. The new LOVEFUCKERS-production puts the audience in a situation on the edge of reality and fiction. Two performers use their private names and stories as well as the methods of nigeria-scams- because that’s what the show is all about: trust and authenticity, fraud and cheating. What is the value of a compliment made on stage? How much does it need to seduce my thoughts? Will one of the performers be naked tonight? Do I want to see that? And all of a sudden another audience member earns 10.000 Euros at the end of the show. No doubt, no problem, for real. The performance is build around two basic elements: the usage of alive camera and the direct contact between the performers and the audience. Small photos are filmed and projected at the back wall, so they become background landscapes and interiors. Those are the settings for puppets made of paper and the performers themselves. At the very beginning of the show the two performers welcome the audience by promising a “night without without any fake”. There shall only be honesty and trust between performers and spectators. Private photos are shown, people are called to dance on stage and to sing karaoke. What appears to be a casual way of getting to know each other turns out to be based on a very sincere matter for the LOVEFUCKERS: There is a whole lot of money the performers want to get rid of. Tonight. So eventually 10.000 Euros are transferred online to one of the spectators. The transaction is seen by everybody…
Idea, Performance Ivana Sajevic, Nils Zapfe
Final View France-Elena Damian
Technician Sebastian K. König
Produced by LOVEFUCKERS and Sophiensaele Berlin
Bad boys – Who the fuck wants to be nice
Premiere: 24.09.2014
“A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do”.
Concept, Installation, Performer: Ivana Sajevic, Annemie Twardawa
Dolls: Annemie Twardawa
Video: Christoph Kube
Security: Charles Ndong
Part of the Festival „Men in Garages“ in Sophiensaele, Berlin .
BERLIN PLAYBOY
©Katja Riemer
A Walking-Act with and by Rolf Eden as a part of the festival: “Berlin del Mar”, Sophiensaele 2011
Performance and everything: Ivana Sajević & Anna Menzel
Puppets: Dorit Agater
FIXEN – Die Ballade von der medialen Abhängigkeit
©Christian Marquardt
Premiere: 7.6.2012
RUHRNACHRICHTEN, 15. Januar 2013
Multimedia Ride
“(…) The ingenious punch-line: The performance mixes authentic details of Tom Kummer’s life with fictional scenes and dream-like sequences. That way the true story becomes the visual programme of the piece itself. This road trip on the sharp edge between fiction and reality makes the LOVEFUCKERS show everything a theatre has to offer. Take the stage design of Bertolt Brecht, puppet scenes, short movies, live music and projections of illustrations (that are made on stage) – every single element of this multimedia performance belongs to the other and make the piece diverse and entertaining at the same time. A fantastic effort!”
WAZ, 14. Januar 2013
“(…) Using a brilliant variety of theatre elements the Berlinbased group told the (very true, but very well faked) story of a journalist who runs after money and fame.”
Regie: Nils Zapfe
Concept: Ivana Sajević, Nils Zapfe
Dolls: Ivana Sajević, Annemie Twardawa
Installation: Sebastian Valk
Puppets, Performer: Anna Menzel, Annemie Twardawa, Jonas Baeck
Liveillustration, Performer: John Fleisch
Eine Koproduktion von LOVEFUCKERS, dem Prinz-Regent-Theater Bochum und SOPHIENSÆLE. Gefördert vom Fonds Darstellende Künste. Mit freundlicher Unterstützung von Pack Attack. Dank an HfS Ernst Busch Abteilung Puppenspiel und taz. Die tageszeitung.
KING OF THE KINGS
© Gerhard F. Ludwig
Premiere: 10.3.2011
BERLINER ZEITUNG 12.März 2011 (Sophiensaele)
“(…) This Puppet-Performer-Theatre is unique because of its funny and virtuously composed ensemble action. Every technical movement is part of the story-telling process as well, which not only ridicules the monstrous hybrid-creature of the dictator, but also develops a very special multi-artistic hybrid-theatre of its own.”
HAMBURGER ABENDBLATT, 31. März 2011 (Kampnagel)
“It does not take long until everybody in the audience knows who Gaddafi is. A grumbling, giggling and gloating puppet with silly sunglasses, who writes his decrees on toilet paper and flies away on a fabulous flying carpet when he no longer knows what to do. The performers change the leading vocal parts of Gaddafi, wearing trashy Supergirl-costumes. (…) A completely hilarious, but brutally funny and amusing desert-james-bond.”
Performer: Anna Menzel, Annemie Twardawa, Nils Zapfe, Dennis Katzmann
Regie, Concept: Ivana Sajeviç
Installation: Basti Valk
Dolls: Dorit Agater
Costums: Sasha Matteucci
Music: Yujiro Akihiro
Video: Christoph Kube
Co-Produktion: Freischwimmer Festival, gefördert mit Mitteln der Allianz Kulturstiftung
PIEPS! You little bird.
Premiere: Herbst 2009
A Music-Trash-Show with and about Serialkillers.
„If Quentin Tarantino would do puppet theater- that is how it would look like.“ (Hundertwortkritik)
Juryprice of 100 ° – Festival at Sophiensaelen Berlin 2010
Performance and everything: Ivana Sajević & Anna Menzel
Participants: Nora Pagel, Anna Maria Rippl, Anna Grodecki, Jochen Menzel, France Elena Damian & Christoph Kube