II, Theaterstücke 17, (Lebendige Stunden. Vier Einakter, 0), Marionetten. Drei Einakter, Seite 97

1. Marienetfen— zuklus box 22/11
HES. SUNDAT. AUGUST 16, 1914.
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AND ADNCAL

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children allke of larger and of lesser
growth?
Only a lazy mind would rebel at the
exactions made by the incomp’eteness
of these designs, and even a lazy mind
might very well be stimulated to
hesithful exertions byrthe tonic of the
color.
Not far from the Thorn-Prikker
Chapel is the Marionetten Theatre,
brought from Munich by Prof. Braun,
and affording another proof of the
general turning of art toward primitive
avenues of expression. Here again
one finds opportunity to exereise the
imagination made heavy by a long
course of realism. Prof. Braun has,
however, very cleverly estimated the
agility of the publie mind, fattened and
stiffened and needing much help in the
mildest of fmaginative flights. The
marionettes as he creates or recreates
them are no longer the comparatively
Traw materlal of the Punch and Judy
show. One goes to the little black¬
Lowar Rhainien baildin
durtained theatre with its plaques, of
in thie exhbition.
strong, vivaclous color in a reminis¬
cent mood. Back there in Paris it has
other. Instead of a colored drawing
been easy to pause on the way to the
he makes a linear diagram, writing
Bbis for the simple fun of watching
in the spaces reserved for color thef
the battered dolls of Peti: Guignol
names of the colors contained in his
compesition, or their numbers as they
beating one another to the music of
are known in the workshop. The
childish ejaculations. For centurles
method closely approaches that of the
such battered dolls have engaged in
musical composer who uses his system
ploodless conflict; for centuries Gull¬
of notes to bulld up symphonies that
laume has applied his cudgel to the
others may produce without having
shoulders of Pierre only to be Inordi¬
heard his personal interpretation.
nately surprised by the cudgel of
Thus the master of the workshop can
Pierre reciprocally dessending upon
make the result to a certaln degree
the shoulders of Guillaurne; for cent¬
his own by his indlvidual variations
uries the man behind the curtain has
of.the color.
asked the front benches to decide the
Thorn-Prikker has been happy in
)fate of Gulllaume and the front
the interpreters. The color of the win¬
benches have pleaded that Guillaume
eeh
echrudeiternscheiercerieeichnnt-e
acinieehdbe

11
Aenteseeee

FERRE
Schnitzler, Der Tapfere Casslan,“
bensting and eäling and
gaming and dueling, every wint as
good melodrama as the conflicts of
Pierre and Gulllaume, yet served witkt
psychological spice, the same thaf
made“ Dr. Bernhardi“ notable in it.
decade. The characters are the char.
acters of the human world, whittled
from wooden blocks to suit the per¬
formance and its masque of un¬
reality, yet singing the unmistakable
song of life through a singularly com¬
petent mechanism.
Of course this competent mechanism
is all that solicits yon as von sit in the
decbrated box of a room absorbed in
the puppets, dipping and kneeling and
skipping and nodding, embracing, be¬
seeching, with a marvelous freedom ef
gesture, almost too close to reality at
times, yet saved, duite completely
saved, by irresistible angularities turn¬
ing a threatened sentiment into deco¬
rative farce. The singing from behind
the scenes is fitted with precision 10
the gesture, and one learns how lttie
a face does for the significance of #
dramatic line.
Out of the theatre into the exhibition
grounds you go, pondering the reie
tion between these abstractions child¬
ishly conveying a vivid Intellectual
## geption and the future of modern
drama, the future, for that matter, or
modern art. It is the same you #
with this form of expression as with
that chosen by Thorn-Prikker for nis
windows. There must be the #ymbol
of emotion and the right syrnbol fer
the right emotion, and an artist must
be the composer, and the effect must
be deen enouch fer cbllühece und
simpie enough for maturtee and #e
vou have your modern art whether it
is made with pieres of wood or pleces
of glass.
205
You wander through the exhisitioa
grounds and note the wide arsa of
interests invaded by the art impulse.
Here are littie workingmen's heuses
with neat placards telling you How
much the tubs cost and the sink and
the wallpaper and the linoleum, and
the general impression is neither sta¬
taticat hon ampoverished, but of homen
pleasant to the eye, wholesome and
fatr. Here is the Werkbund Theatre
with its threefold stage, and here is
the Haus der Frau in which thefac¬
tivitles of German women are given
the ample place they demand.
800
Tou think to yourselt what a useful
nation is this, what promise it holds
of an industrial growthafrom roots
that have been planted deep in the.
native soll and well güärded from ac¬
eident and negligence. You think to¬
yourself that German industrial art
hasa chance to cönquer the worid,
not by its aesthetic superlority to
that of other nations, but by that:
splendid vital forcethat turns it into
the waste places to make them bloon.
In freshnes#sthät adds the plensurer