Pina Bausch: Vollmond

On a rainy night, with neither umbrellas nor shelter, the performers of Vollmond plunge into love as one might dive into a river, not knowing where the current will carry them. They embrace, contradict, caress, drag and strike one another under the cold glow of the full moon. “What is better: a great love with all its tremors and upheavals at once, or a little love each day?” asks Maria Giovanna Delle Donne, acting as mistress of ceremonies for the night.

Premiered in 2006 in Wuppertal, Vollmond (Full Moon) lights up the Théâtre de la Ville in Paris until 23 May with the damp poetry and brutal honesty of Tanztheater Wuppertal. This moon casts light on desire but also on its stumbles. On stage, a stream flows beneath a large rock. Is it a cave, a meteorite, or an allegory for the obstacles that stand in love’s way? That unstable space – black, glistening, hypnotic – becomes a battleground of the heart for the twelve performers who give form to one of Pina Bausch’s final physical and emotional works.

High poetry mingles with childlike play, sensuality with unease, longing with clumsiness. Two men spit water at each other. Another transforms into an armchair to cradle his beloved. Soaked, a dancer declares, “Please, hold on tight. A stormy night lies ahead,” fastening her belt as if that gesture alone might spare her from tragedy.

In the first half, fierce solos alternate with comic duels and frantic outbursts of desire. With dresses drenched, the dancers appear as sensual as they are defenceless. They seek love and surrender to it, just as they would to the elements. But the path is long and strewn with stones. Often, their advances are poorly timed. Flirtation drips with mischief, yearning, and melancholy, yet the intensity of their acts soon drives others away. Or is it the full moon that unleashes such impulsive agitation? Solid choreography, stick fights, and chair dances follow one another until the first act closes with a strikingly beautiful image: bodies crossing the stream, gliding beneath the stone.

Through a poetic and dreamlike lens, Bausch explores the tensions between men and women and their attempts, at times comic, at others painful, to attain happiness. In dance-theatre, immediate emotion takes precedence over rational explanation. There are no linear narratives, no single interpretations: what unfolds on stage defies certainty and demands a sensorial reading.

Though Vollmond is one of Tanztheater Wuppertal’s ‘water pieces’, here water is not set dressing: it is the language of the body. In this fragile, spectral setting, the dancers dive in without fear. It drizzles, it pours, and still they dance. The full moon and the water become potent symbols, inscribed in the choreography with both beauty and emotional unravelling.

The second act leans into a musical melancholy. The performers walk across the rock as if along the hallway of their own home. A woman, lying on an inflatable mattress, drifts like a postmodern Ophelia. In this serene interlude, an unexpected truce emerges: five couples dance in an embrace, neither fleeing nor resisting. But stillness is fleeting. Chaos returns, and it is Julie Anne Stanzak who bursts forth in a dazzling solo, as five men hurl buckets of water at the rock — one of the production’s most mesmerising tableaux.

Humour, so intrinsic to Bausch, is here shadowed by cynicism. “I’m a little bitter,” says Taylor Drury, rubbing half a lemon across her body. Another dancer hits herself to force a laugh. Dance becomes the final refuge. And yet, Vollmond never slips into sentimentality. It is dark, but not sorrowful; desperate, yet never defeatist. Each movement – sudden, trembling, repeated – is a bid for connection. All are searching, none find, and still, no one gives up.

Motifs and scenes echo and return. Music by the Balanescu Quartet, Tom Waits and René Aubry subtly underscores the piece’s emotional undulations. In the final track by Cujo, an electronic frenzy erupts, sparking catharsis: everyone dances seated, drenched, or launches into fleeting, fervent solos in the water. It is the final apotheosis.

Pina Bausch’s pieces, without answers or morals, are not to be explained, but felt. Her elusive choreographies retain an intensity that never fades. Thanks to their honesty and timeless aesthetic, far removed from formulas or predictable structures, her work endures. Though she never sought technical perfection, each gesture is honed with precision and beauty. This is why her works continue to move us: they radiate authenticity.

Vollmond is a storm of images – wet, gleaming, absurd, whimsical, and achingly human – that cling to the skin beneath the full moon. Its optimistic finale offers a kind of solace: the fleeting sense of having shared a fragile moment together. Vollmond stirs, shakes, and soothes the soul. And reminds us that when it comes to love, one must always be willing to get soaked.