URSULA KAUFMANN
Ursula Kaufmann’s photography of Jochen Ulrich’s choreographic work is a stunning visual archive of German contemporary dance. She documented Ulrich’s productions from 1997 to 2013, capturing performances across cities like Aachen, Linz, Innsbruck, and Reykjavik A. Her images reflect the emotional depth, theatrical flair, and physical dynamism of Ulrich’s style.
Some of the choreographies she photographed include:“Romeo und Julia”, “Campo Amor”, “Casanova”, “3xLorca”, “La Stravaganza”, “Schwanensee-Rockballett”, “Caravaggio”, "KAFKA AMERIKA", “Das Narrenschiff”, “Michelangelo”, “Anna Karenina”, “Dornröschen”, “Fidelio”.These works span classical reinterpretations and bold contemporary pieces, and Kaufmann’s lens brings out their theatrical intensity and poetic movement.
You can explore her full gallery of Jochen Ulrich’s work on Ursula Kaufmann’s official site B or read more about her archival project during the pandemic on tanznetz.de.
OUT OF HER WEBSITE HERE A OVERVIEW WITH DESCRIPTION OF EACH BALLET.
KAFKA AMERIKA
Kafka Amerika - Landestheater LInz 2009 - Jochen Ulrich, Kurt Schwertzik, Simon Corder, Bjanka Ursulov - Jonatan Salgado Romero, Ilja van den Bosch, Matej Pagjert, Alexander Novikov and Dancers of the Jochen Ulrich Company at the Landestheater Linz
Jochen Ulrich’s reflection on his choreography:
Genesis of the Ballet
Jochen Ulrich was inspired by Federico García Lorca’s The Walk of Buster Keaton, which led him to Kafka’s Amerika. He saw parallels between Karl Roßmann and Buster Keaton—both figures who endure hardship with quiet resilience.
Collaboration and Vision
In Linz, Ulrich aimed to create contemporary works with modern artists. He chose composer Kurt Schwertsik, known for his wit and emotional depth, to bring Kafka’s spirit to life through music. They had previously collaborated in the 1970s on Walzerträume.
Creative Process
Ulrich wrote the libretto, and Schwertsik composed the music largely independently. When the music arrived, Ulrich found it matched—and even exceeded—his vision. He describes the result as a revelation, capturing the inner imagery he sought to express on stage.
ROMEO AND JULIET
Romeo and Juliet – Adaptation of the original production by Tanz Forum Jochen Ulrich, Opera of the City of Cologne, presented for the opening of the new Music Theatre at Volksgarten Linz in May 2013.
Restaging: Darie Cardyn and Leszek Kuligowski - Choreography & Direction: Jochen Ulrich - Set Design: Kathrin Kegler Fritsch - Costumes: Marie-Thérèse Cramer - Lighting: Johann Hofbauer - Musical Direction: Dennis Russell Davies - Orchestra: Bruckner Orchestra Linz
Cast: Romeo: Jonatan Salgado Romero - Juliet: Agnes Schmetterer - Tybalt: Ziga Jereb - Mercutio: Alexander Novikov - Nurse: Anna Sterbova - Lady Capulet: Irene Bauer - Padre Lorenzo: Werner Kalb - Featuring the ensemble of the Jochen Ulrich Company of the Landestheater Linz and guest performers, with support from the Extras of the Landestheater Linz.
ANNA KARENINA
“It’s a grand evening. Ballet cinema in widescreen format, so to speak. One that pulls out all the register.”
"Ulrich, a pioneer of modern dance theatre in Germany, infused the production with emotional depth and dramatic tension, capturing Anna’s tragic descent with haunting beauty."
Jochen Ulrich’s Anna Karenina ballet at the Landestheater Linz is a stunning and powerful ballet adaptation of Leo Tolstoy’s classic novel, transformed into a visceral dance drama that pulses with emotion, elegance, and tragedy and brought to life with intense choreography and evocative staging.
About the Production
Premiered in October 2010, Ulrich’s choreography captures the sweeping emotional arcs of Tolstoy’s characters—Anna’s doomed passion, Kitty’s heartbreak and redemption, and Levin’s existential search for meaning.
Outstanding Acting Performances
A fear that is justified, since the oh-so-moral St. Petersburg society and beyond that, the Russian society of the 19th century, as characterized by Tolstoy in his novel, presented by Ulrich in his dance piece, and portrayed by Ulrich’s company with outstanding acting,ostracizes Anna Karenina as an unfaithful and immoral wife. Although there exists a large web of friends and relatives among the three protagonists, about whom much could be said, let it just be mentioned that the dancers, despite their athletic orientation, give the impression of absolute weightlessness.
The ballet explores themes of passion, societal constraints, and personal downfall, with Anna’s story unfolding through expressive movement and rich musical textures. The staging often features grand visual elements like sweeping curtains and glass façades, evoking the opulence and isolation of 19th-century Russian aristocracy.
It is set to the evocative music of Sergei Rachmaninoff, including his Symphony No. 2, Symphony No. 3, and The Isle of the Dead, performed live by the Bruckner Orchester Linz under Ingo Ingensand. Set Design: Alexandra Pitz created a timeless, elegant stage with dramatic lighting by Johann Hofbauer, including shimmering crystal chandeliers that rise and fall like emotional tides. Costumes: Marie-Therese Cramer’s designs envelop the dancers in rich fabrics and colors, enhancing the ballet’s emotional depth.
Cast:
Music Director: Ingo Ingesand, Choreography and Staging: Jochen Ulrich, Choreograpic collaboration: Darie Cardyn, Set Design: Alexandra Ptiz, Costumes design: Marie Thérèse Cramer, Ligths: Johann Hoffbauer, Dramaturgy: Julia Zigler
Anna Štěrbová portrayed the tormented Anna, with Martin Dvořák as Karenin and Žiga Jereb as the passionate Wronski.
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La Cabina 26
La Cabina 26 is a ballet choreographed by Jochen Ulrich, first performed in Cologne in 1994 with the Tanz-Forum Köln. The piece is based on music by La Fura dels Baus, a groundbreaking Spanish theater group known for their experimental and immersive performances. The specific track, also titled La Cabina 26, was released in 1990 and features vocals by Ginesa Ortega. It blends industrial sounds, flamenco influences, and electronic textures—creating a raw, ritualistic energy that Ulrich translated into powerful movement on stage.
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Campo Amor
Jochen Ulrich’s Campo Amor is a deeply poetic ballet that premiered on May 3, 2008 at the Landestheater Linz. Inspired by Torquato Tasso’s epic poem La Gerusalemme Liberata, particularly the 12th canto, the ballet dramatizes the tragic love and fatal duel between Tancredi and Clorinda, two warriors on opposing sides who unknowingly fall victim to fate and mistaken identity.
Ulrich’s choreography is set to a rich and eclectic score, blending: Claudio Monteverdi’s Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda Philip Glass’s The Hours and Henry Purcell’s Aria of the Genius of Cold, performed Live and famously interpreted by Martin Archrainer. The ballet opens with a cinematic projection and voiceover, setting a dreamlike tone. A massive white fabric emerges from the orchestra pit, releasing dancers like spirits of memory.
A backdrop reveals the image of the ruined Campo Amor theater in Havana, reflecting themes of decay, illusion, and lost grandeur.
One of the most striking scenes in Jochen Ulrich’s Campo Amor ballet involves dancing in water, turning the stage into a shimmering, emotional landscape. In the climactic moment, after Tancredi unknowingly kills Clorinda, the stage transforms into a blue-green pool, evoking a “sea of tears.” Water pours from above, flooding the space as dancers representing souls and memories move through it in a haunting, almost ritualistic choreography. The imagery draws heavily from the Orpheus myth, with Tancredi trying to retrieve Clorinda from the realm of the dead, only to be overwhelmed by grief and illusion.
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Lorenzaccio
Jochen Ulrich’s Lorenzaccio is a striking ballet adaptation of Alfred de Musset’s dramatic play, reimagined through Ulrich’s emotionally charged choreography. This production premiered at the Landestheater Linz in 2006 and is known for its intense exploration of power, identity, and betrayal.
The premiere, Lorenzaccio, proves to be a grand narrative ballet with a contemporary touch. In it, Ulrich intensifies the conflict of power and desire around the tyrannical Duke of Florence and his cousin Lorenzo de Medici, known as Lorenzaccio. Ulrich relie on the emotional drive of his stage characters. Especially in the first part, there are images of directorial richness, reminiscent of Ulrich’s best works. The commissioned music composed by Alexander Balanescu, who, at the premiere, also played solo violin with the Bruckner Orchestra under Ingo Ingensand. Working strongly with repetitive material imbued with an elegiac, Slavic undertone, Balanescu’s conception feels more like film music. An intense and dynamic portrayal of the conflict around power and eroticism, the music creates a more melancholic and contemplative atmosphere. These different approaches lead to an exciting and multi-layered interpretation of the piece, highlighting various aspects of the plot and characters.
Choreography & Libretto: Jochen Ulrich - Music: Composed by Alexander Balanescu - The staging and costume design: by Bjanka Ursulov were praised for their dramatic flair and symbolic contrasts.
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Das Narrenschiff "Ship of Fools"
Jochen Ulrich’s Das Narrenschiff was indeed his final major ballet work a powerful, allegorical production that premiered on May 23, 2012 at the Landestheater Linz. It is based on the novel Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter, which portrays a colorful society aboard a passenger ship traveling from Mexico to Germany in the 1930s on the eve of Nazi rule.
The ship becomes a stage for human weaknesses, desires, and conflicts. Ulrich staged the journey as a kind of masquerade ball, where civilizational taboos fall away and the mood gradually shifts into something ominous.
The music supported by a live band and singer Daniela Dett, who together created a dark and haunting atmosphere.
Particularly striking: the Mambo troupe, whose performances reflect the explosive social dynamics aboard the ship. This journey into chaos after all, we are in the early 1930s and the ship is heading toward Germany is the subject of ballet director Jochen Ulrich’s final new production of the season. Set to music specially arranged and composed for this evening by David Wagner ranging from fiery Latin American mambo rhythms of the 1930s and 1940s (including Xavier Cugat), to yearning songs by Zarah Leander and Marlene Dietrich, well-known jazz and blues standards (Night Time Is the Right Time, Put the Blame on Mame, etc.), and the waltzing ecstasy of Johann Strauss or Emmerich Kálmán Ulrich’s choreography and staging will focus on razor-sharp and absurd imagery that, whether stirring or touching, is above all: an amusingly grotesque yet threatening dance on the edge.
Music arrangements and composition: David Wagner & Musical direction: David Wagner - Choreography and staging: Jochen Ulrich - Set design: Alexandra Pitz - Costumes: Marie-Therese Cramer - Dramaturgy: Julia Zirkler
Cast:
Thiele, ship captain: Ziga Jereb, First officer: Matej Pajgert, Dr. Schumann, ship’s doctor: Fabrice Jucquois, The author: Sarah Deltenre, La Condesa, deported to Tenerife as a political exile: Darie Cardyn, Mary Treadwell, a divorced woman returning to Paris: Anna Štěrbová, A diplomat: Wallace Jones, Johann, cabin boy: Gabriel Wanka, Mrs. Schmitt, recently widowed in Mexico: Clara Pascual Martí, Elsa, her daughter: Agata Moll, Mr. Rieber: Alister Noblet, Miss Lizzi Spöckenkieker: Lucia Patoprstá, Mr. Freytag, a homeless man: Sakher Almonem, Reinaldo, a South American: Alexander Novikov, Lola, a singer: Daniela Dett, Amparo, a dancer: Viktoria Slavina, David Scott & Jenny Brown, a young married couple, both painters on their first trip to Europe: Morgan Reid, Tine Schmidt,
David Wagner & Band:
Ewald Zach, Hubert Kalupa, Gerd Rahstorfer, Bernhard Kitzmüller, and Bernhard Walchshofer
Die Winterreise
Landestheater Linz, premiere on February 26, 2011.
"Die Winterreise" is the name Jochen Ulrich has given to his new ballet, and indeed, he has chosen songs from Franz Schubert's song cycle "Winterreise" as musical material together with the composer Heinz Winbeck. What is mild sorrow and sweet melancholy in Schubert becomes, through Ulrich-Winbeck, a wild ride into the eerie depths of human emotions. When music and dance (stage events) flow from a single source, with no element vying for precedence over another, a special evening is created, intense and exciting, stirring and frightening, but also delightful.(uncoy.com)
Ulrich worked with all his known elements and vocabulary, but in Linz, he had not yet shown a ballet in which the dance was so much in harmony with the music, in which the ensemble appeared so homogeneous and well-trained, and which, without telling a clumsy story, was so gripping and impressive. Music and images like Schubert the audience thanked with frenetic applause and cheers. If someone rhymes Linz with province, they only show their ignorance. (Tanz At)
Cast
Musikalische Leitung Dennis Russell Davies / Takeshi Moriuchi, Choreography and staging: Jochen Ulrich, Choreographic collaboration: Darie Cardyn
Set and costums design: Gottfried Pilz, Dramaturgiy: Julia Zirkler.
Host: Ziga Jereb, The Bride:Clara Pascual Martí, Her Mother: Irene Bauer, Her father: Fabrice Jucquois, Her sister: Anna Štěrbová, Her Brother in law: Wallace Jones, Her Unkel: Daniel Morales Pérez, The groom: Matej Pajgert, His Mother: Sarah Deltenre. His Father: Alexander Novikov, His Brother: Emilijus Miliauskas, His cousins: Lucia Patoprstá, His sister in law: Marietta Kro,
The Pianist: Maki Namekawa, the Singer: Martin Achrainer / Katerina Hebelkova and The Bruckner Orchester Linz.
