Among the case studies in the scenography section is a production of *Parsifal* at the Goetheanum in Dornach, near Basel. Rudolf Steiner’s vision of staging this opera there was realised almost 100 years after his death.
Richard Wagner’s final work, “Parsifal“, was described by him not as an opera but as a ‘sacred festival stage play’ and premiered in Bayreuth in 1882. Wagner died just one year later. His widow Cosima imposed a 30-year (until 1914) ban on performances outside the Bayreuth Festival Theatre. At the request of King Ludwig II, who had been a major patron of the work, she made an exception solely for him, allowing special performances in Munich in 1884/85. The NewYork MET ignored the ban in 1903.
The stage design from the premiere production is the longest-running production in Bayreuth and was finally renewed in 1930 after 48 years. The famous theatre painters, the Brückner brothers from Coburg, Germany, executed it based on preliminary designs by Paul von Joukowsky. Due to the ban on performances elsewhere, this design long set the style for subsequent productions as well.
The anthroposophical movement, and above all its founder Rudolf Steiner, has always been fascinated by this work. And so, even during Steiner’s lifetime, the desire arose to stage *Parsifal* at the Goetheanum in Dornach.
Steiner died in 1925, and a good two years earlier the original building had been destroyed by arson. However, the Goetheanum, rebuilt according to his designs, did not open until 1928.
Although the building offers 1,000 seats and features a traditional stage house with the technology common at the time, it lacked an orchestra pit. All musical performances – primarily eurythmy – require only a few musicians, who were accommodated on the stage itself. It is thanks to the patron Alexander von Glenck that an orchestra pit was installed at his expense in 2022, and a production team was subsequently found to develop a staging. Since 2023, there have been three performances each year shortly before Easter, the traditional time for this work due to its content (the third act takes place on Good Friday).
Goetheanum, Dornach – Stage – photo: Stefan Gräbener
The relatively young set and costume designer Walter Schütze (who originally comes from a background in architecture) and the director Jasmin Solfaghari now had to grapple not only with the usual challenges but also with aspects of anthroposophy and, above all, eurythmy. Eurythmy became an integral part of this production and significantly broadens the scope of the more or less standard design process. Stefan Hasler, the director of eurythmy at Dornach, thus came on board as the third member of the creative team and had to familiarise the director and the set and costume designer with this specific subject matter.
A symposium lasting several days accompanied the project in its premiere year, 2023, featuring numerous lectures by all those involved from every field, which were subsequently compiled in a publication.
This production is also particularly well-suited as a case study, as all the material – ranging from the set and costume design to the technical planning and implementation, as well as the aforementioned accompanying lectures and the general development process in collaboration with the director and the eurythmists – is readily available. All those involved are available for discussions and, if required, interviews, and as the production was also staged this year, it was possible to attend a performance in person.
Dr. Stefan Gräbener, april 20th, 2026
Richard Wagner: PARSIFAL
Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland, march 20th 2026
Director: Jasmin Solfaghari
SetDesign, Costume, Video: Walter Schütze
Goetheanum-Eurythmie-Ensemble
Else-Klink-Ensemble, Eurythemum Stuttgart
Director Eurythmy: Stefan Hasler
Philharmonie Baden-Baden
Vokalwerk der Opernfestspiele Heidenheim
Conductor: Roland Fister
Performance march 20th 2026, creative team
Jasmin Solfaghari, Walter Schütze, Stefan Hasler – photo: Stefan Gräbener
Links
Paul von Joukowsky – Wikipedia de
Max Brückner (artist) – Wikipedia en
In recent years, the question of mediation has played an increasingly important role in the arts, cultural institutions, and the corresponding fields of researching and teaching. Mediation can be pedagogical, political, cross-disciplinary and cross-media, intertwining, reconciling and culturally effective, etc. The symposium Building Bridges: Collecting, Researching and Mediating the Performing Arts, will gather representatives of the performing arts, theatre and dance researchers, archivists, librarians and curators to discuss what connects us: the shared passion and curatorial or scientific curiosity about the performing arts in all their facets – present and historical.
The notion of “building bridges” forms the dramaturgical framework of the symposium.
Chris Van Goethem and Stefan Gräbener presented and explained the upcoming phase 2 of the CANON project during the poster presentation and in personal discussions.
https://www.sibmas.org/conference/building-bridges-symposium-2025
https://www.sibmas.org/conference/building-bridges-symposium-2025/programme-6-7-june-2025
