Bridge Markland
Bridge Markland
Sunday, March 17, 2013
photo: Vera Hofmann
Bridge Markland, acclaimed performer from Berlin (*1961 in Berlin - West), is a virtuosa/o of role-play and transformation. She is an artist who effortlessly crosses all boundaries between sub- and high-culture, dance, theatre, cabaret, performance, puppetry and erotic-art. Her specialty are transgender-performances in which the audience can experience the change of woman to man (or vice versa). She is a pioneer of drag and gender performance in Germany and has organized Drag King events, tours and festivals from 1994 - 2002.
Other focus points of her work are lip-synced one woman shows with role change, puppets and pop music of classical German plays: J.W. Goethe’s Faust I as “faust in the box” (available for booking in English or German), Friedrich Schiller’s The Robbers as “robbers in the box” (available for booking in Eng lish or German) and several others; collaborations with artists of various genres – music, theatre, dance, performance, children’s theatre; performer with several companies, such as “Dances For Non/Fictional Bodies” with Jess Curtis Gravity, San Francisco/Berlin 2010/2011, aufBruch prison theatre company, Berlin 2011; site-specific dance improvisations and audience interactions.
Bridge Markland has performed her numerous short and long productions to great acclaim in Germany, Europe, USA, Canada and Australia.
She gives accessible, fun, and provocative talks about her life and work, which emphasize the development of her transgender work. The audience will hear fascinating details about the origin of her performances and have the opportunity for Q & A afterwards.
Even when Bridge was very young, she already perceived herself as different. The expression non-binary – to mean not to belong to either gender – had not yet been coined.
Bridge called herself an androgynous woman. At first, she only played with gender roles on stage as a hobby. In the daytime, she became a certified gymnastics instructor. But by the mid-1990s, Bridge was such a successful performer that she could give up her day job.
Report by Sylvia Wassermann.