Rethinking Political Assembly in Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 185 DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 Rethinking Political Assembly in Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 Katharina Schmid-Schmidsfelden Indiana University Bloomington Abstract: This article examines Baden im Wolfgangsee , an action performed by Christoph Schlingensief during the election campaign of his political party Chance 2000 � Schlingensief sought to make marginalized people visible by calling for Germany’s six million unemployed to enter Austria’s Wolfgangsee simultaneously, while he invited others at home to enter their bathtubs to show solidarity with the unemployed� By contrasting this action with Einkaufen im KaDeWe , in which Chance 2000 party members entered a posh shopping mall, this article demonstrates how solidarity overcomes the distinction between presence and absence and turns the private sphere of the home into a political sphere� Drawing on theories of assembly and performance by Hannah Arendt and Judith Butler, I read these two actions as different acts of solidarity. Keywords: performance, postdramatic theater, Christoph Schlingensief, assembly, solidarity, private and public sphere, political theater, Chance 2000 Christoph Schlingensief ’s work has often been understood through notions of disruption (Koch) and destruction (Gade). His Aktion Chance 2000 (1998), which founded a legally recognized political party in Germany, is no exception� There is a consensus that Schlingensief and his collaborators disrupted the German public sphere� In German media, he was portrayed as a radical critic and provocateur� This article shifts the focus from Schlingensief ’s irritation of spectators towards the power of assembly and solidarity by focusing on the participation of the public and Schlingensief ’s crew in the Chance 2000 actions� It contrasts two Chance 2000 events, Baden im Wolfgangsee and Einkaufen im KaDeWe , to show how assembly is related to physical and remote presence� While Einkaufen im KaDeWe performs the limits of physical presence, Baden im Wolfgangsee instrumentalizes absences to create solidarity from afar� 186 Katharina Schmid-Schmidsfelden DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 These performances both illuminate and challenge the connections between art and politics and between the private and public spheres� Using concepts derived from Hannah Arendt’s The Human Condition (1958) and Judith Butler’s Notes Towards a Performative Theory of Assembly (2015), this article theorizes performative assembly� Through Arendt’s concept of “acting in concert,” I argue that physical presence is not a prerequisite for collective action� I demonstrate how “the very […] bonds of solidarity […] emerge across space and time” in Schlingensief ’s Aktionen (Butler 100). Schlingensief scholarship has focused on his engagement with the media and the public (Forrest, Scheer, Gade), often emphasizing Schlingensief ’s disruptions (Koch) rather than forms of assembly. Both Koch (2014) and Perrucci (2018) focus on the disruptive characteristics of Chance 2000 , emphasizing concepts such as “Bilderstörung” (Koch) and “irritation” (Perrucci). Perrucci’s idea of an “aesthetic of total irritation , ” which he takes from Boris Groys, focuses on the spectator rather than on those who assemble (Perrucci 483—84). Koch emphasizes an aesthetic of disruption as a mode of action ( Aktionsweise ) for Schlingensief, focusing on the reactions of the spectators (“den Skandal erzeugen die anderen” (Koch 2)) and of society, rather than the participants. In a similar vein, Irene Albers focuses on Carl Hegemann’s term “crisis experiment” ( Krisenexperiment )� She states that Schlingensief ’s action-based theater is more about disrupting and challenging the staging itself rather than reality� However, Schlingensief ’s disruptions have also been read as challenges to the political� Solveig Gade (2010) discusses publics and counter-publics in Chance 2000 , claiming (in the title of her article) that Schlingensief is “putting the public sphere to the test�” Gade’s main argument is that the members of Schlingensief ’s party create a counter-public� This article departs from previous scholarship by highlighting the importance of acting within the private sphere� I argue that private and public spheres can, in Arendt’s terms, stand in solidarity and “act in concert�” During the 1998 German elections, Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 party gave visibility to those often ignored and excluded by the government, employing slogans such as “Wähle dich selbst” 1 or “Scheitern als Chance�” Starting at Zirkus Sperlich in Berlin, Schlingensief and his crew carried out multiple events, including internal party elections and public interventions, which problematized the relationship of the individual or certain groups to society� These actions involved riding the subway together while chanting, going shopping in the Kaufhaus des Westens (KaDeWe) as a group, or spending the night together at Hotel Prora� 2 The breadth of party activities and Schlingensief ’s relentless calls for action and participation make the full scope of his intervention difficult to grasp. He often underscored the ambiguity inherent to the performance situation by ask- DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 Rethinking Political Assembly in Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 187 ing his audience and party members: “Are you still here? Do you still exist? ” Understanding the extent of the party’s activities is particularly challenging for scholars, since party events were captured on camera only sporadically� The documentary Chance 2000: Partei der letzten Chance (2017) by Kathrin Krottenthaler and Frieder Schlaich employs video footage to create a narrative of how the party functioned and evolved through its many interventions in the public sphere� It documents the historical context of the party’s social engagement: Germany almost ten years after the reunification, during a period of social and political transformation. Although the documentary takes great effort in making Chance 2000 as accessible as possible for future generations, it is still limited to what Schlingensief and others willingly chose to record and share� The Chance 2000 event Baden im Wolfgangsee invited Germany’s six million unemployed to swim in Austria’s Wolfgangsee, home to Helmut Kohl’s vacation house, with the stated aim of flooding his home by raising the lake’s water level. As section 2 of the party’s program states, the unemployed population stood at the center of its concerns� 3 Upon arriving at the lake, Schlingensief greeted everyone present with a handshake, including those who were simply enjoying the lake in private, unaware of the planned intervention� Upon entering the lake, Schlingensief announced through a megaphone: Wir können heute eigentlich nicht privat schwimmen mit dem Bewusstsein, es gibt sechs Millionen Arbeitslose in Deutschland, die nicht mehr vorhanden sind, die auch nicht das Geld haben hierherzukommen, aber diese sechs Millionen Arbeitslosen werde ich heute privat vertreten. ( Partei der letzten Chance , 1: 42: 22) The words privat and vertreten invoke two key concepts: the private sphere and (public) political representation. By pairing these seemingly oppositional terms, Schlingensief highlights the absurdity of both his action and of democratic politics� While representation is a key aspect of the political system in the public sphere, Schlingensief demonstrates its limitations and failures by describing his act of representation as private� In The Human Condition , Arendt writes that only the public realm holds political power, yet Schlingensief claims to act in private , while performing a representative political action in public� Going swimming in private while being filmed by multiple cameras and reporters is a provocation that challenges the distinction between reality and performance� As Carl Hegemann stated in the documentary footage: “Die Presse berichtet darüber ob wir wirklich noch da sind, ob es uns noch gibt, wo die Realität anfängt und wo die Inszenierung aufhört” ( Partei der letzten Chance , 1: 30: 01)� Right before Schlingensief entered the lake, he announced that he had received messages from several associations for the unemployed stating that six million unemployed people would simultaneously enter their bathtubs at home 188 Katharina Schmid-Schmidsfelden DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 in solidarity with the action at the Wolfgangsee� Standing in front of journalists with only a few people - mainly his crew and actors instead of the intended six million - Schlingensief stated: Ich habe zwei Faxnachrichten bekommen von zwei Arbeitslosen-Vereinigungen, die jetzt um 16: 00 Uhr solidarisch mit uns in Deutschland, zu Hause, in ihren Wohnungen, in der Badewanne, baden werden. […] Und deshalb die besten Grüße an alle Arbeitslosen auf der ganzen Welt� Wir werden euch sichtbar machen und wir wissen: die Aufgabe, die wir haben, nehmen wir sehr, sehr ernst. ( Partei der letzten Chance , 1: 46: 29) Terms such as Aufgabe and vertreten intensify the political dimension of the task at hand, even as Schlingensief visually disrupted the seriousness of the message� He made this announcement while wearing a racing suit 4 and holding two inflatable pool animals given to him by Elfriede Jelinek. Jelinek 5 did not want to join Schlingensief and his crew in person, choosing instead to be represented by the animal floats. Her instructions as to how to handle the floats thematize the assembly’s representational character: “Gedacht ist, dass man ihnen [den aufblasbaren Tieren] eine Schnur um den Hals bindet und sie dann hinter sich herzieht, damit ich sozusagen anwesend bin” ( Partei der letzten Chance , 1: 43: 01)� Sozusagen anwesend sein is the key concept for Baden im Wolfgangsee � Jelinek describes an aspect of presence not defined by its physicality, but rather by a proxy-presence (in this case, an inflatable pool animal). While Jelinek did not actively enter the lake alongside the other participants, she participated via an alternative mode of self-presentation� Treating the toys as political representatives, she has “elected” the floaties to swim in her place. Referencing normative representational democratic politics, she performed physical representation by removing herself, which implies both a certain passivity ( hinter sich herziehen lassen ) and simultaneously an active participation from afar� Sozusagen anwesend sein indicates her clear presence through a proxy or representative even while she is physically absent� Through the selection of small, colorful swim floats as her stand-ins, Jelinek undermines this representational act and robs it of its seriousness� 6 Representation, therefore, takes two forms in Baden im Wolfgangsee : Schlingensief ’s claim that he is representing six million unemployed people and Jelinek’s representation by inflatable pool animals. There was never a democratic election granting Schlingensief the right to represent this group. Yet, he sees his representative act as an Aufgabe (task) and refers to bringing Jelinek’s floating animals with political jargon as an Auftrag (order). Theater scholar Andreas Kotte comments: “Er verstand sich als Sprachrohr von ‘6 Millionen Arbeitslosen’, der physisch oder geistig Behinderten und überhaupt der Randgruppen der Gesellschaft” (Kotte 190). At the same time, Schlingensief uses DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 Rethinking Political Assembly in Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 189 representational gestures only to destabilize them� He employs political jargon during his election campaign to interrogate the limits, challenges, and even failures of representational democracy� Events like those at the Wolfgangsee are thus haunted by questions of reality � How realistic or probable were his plans of flooding Helmut Kohl’s holiday home or the party seriously winning the election? Similarly, the fax message makes the audience wonder whether it was a spontaneous improvisation, a joke, or an actual document sent by German unemployment institutions� However, whether the message actually existed is only marginally relevant� Far more important is its inherent ambiguity, which invites speculation as to how two spatially distinct groups of people - the people at the Wolfgangsee and the people theoretically entering their bathtubs in solidarity - can be united in a single assembly. In staging this fax message Schlingensief once again switches between the realms of art and politics� 7 Real or not, the statement still opens up philosophical questions concerning solidarity beyond the limits of the physical event� In Chance 2000 , the lines between art and politics are mostly unrecognizable� Carl Hegemann addresses this ambiguity in an interview on the day of the action: Es hat ja angefangen als Theater eigentlich, es ist halt so ein Theater, wo es den Unterschied zwischen Zuschauerraum und Bühne nicht mehr gibt. Also, wo das eben überall stattfindet in ganz Deutschland und jetzt auch in Österreich und das Problem ist einfach wenn man sagt, das ist jetzt Kunst, dann ist es einfach etikettiert, dann hat die Kunst keine Wirkung mehr, dann heißt es nur “achso ja genau das sind Spinner, Künstler die machen das in ihrem Rahmen” und dass die Kunst wieder ernst genommen wird, deswegen sagt man auch das ist keine Kunst, das ist Realität, […] Wenn die Kunst noch das wäre, was sie sein sollte, nämlich das Unsichtbare sichtbar zu machen, dann wäre es eine Kunstaktion, aber wenn man denkt, Kunst wäre irgendsowas, was die hier zum 17� Mal ihre gleiche Inszenierung abnudeln, dann ist es eben keine Kunst� ( Partei der letzten Chance , 1: 41: 50) Hegemann’s definition of art, as visualizing the invisible, highlights the ‘presence’ of the unemployed again� Schlingensief ’s act of solidarity coincides with Hegemann’s definition of art: drawing attention to what is invisible and absent. Schlingensief ’s utopian project did not meet his own (unrealistic) expectations. Only a few people appeared at the lake, mainly Schlingensief ’s crew, actors and party members: “War ‘ne richtig familiäre Sache, es waren natürlich keine sechs Millionen da […]” ( Partei der letzten Chance , 1: 47: 00)� Even though the number of participants was not as high as expected, this action is one of the central moments for Chance 2000 because of the publicity, visuals and strong reactions surrounding the action� Calling for further involvement beyond the 190 Katharina Schmid-Schmidsfelden DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 event, Schlingensief suggested the possibility of a ritual: “Vielleicht geht dieser Tag in die Geschichte ein� Vielleicht jeden Monat am zweiten eines Monats legt man sich solidarisch in die Badewanne” ( Partei der letzten Chance , 1: 47: 03)� The invitation to this ritual allows for Baden im Wolfgangsee to become an open and productive form, an extension of the original action� In contrast to the notion of “participation from afar” performed in Baden im Wolfgangsee , Chance 2000 ’s other major action, Einkaufen im KaDeWe , models the effects of physical presence. Early on in the Chance 2000 election campaign, Schlingensief took a group of people to the famed Berlin mall Kaufhaus des Westens, or KaDeWe, inviting them to shop as a collective unit� In the documentary, Schlingensief and his crew travel to the mall by subway, all wearing the same white T-shirt with “Chance 2000” in black letters� On their way, many people approach them, asking what sort of club or association they are in� Some then decide to join the group and receive “Chance 2000 - Scheitern als Chance” buttons, which render their spontaneous participation visible� By the time they arrive at the mall’s entrance, there are more people who want to join the collective than there are buttons available� They walk into the building together, and Schlingensief announces: “Achim und Helga wollen heute wieder etwas kaufen”( Partei der letzten Chance, 0: 22: 28)� As the large group of Chance 2000 representatives make their way up the escalator, each of them turns to view the crowd, suggesting that the collective has become larger than anyone anticipated� Achim decides to buy new underwear� While he is looking at different designs, a shop assistant inquires “Was ist das denn hier für ein Verein? ”( Partei der letzten Chance , 0: 24: 01)� Shortly afterwards, someone covers the camera with their hands. The video recording stops; we hear the final words, “Ob sie ‘ne Drehgenehmigung fürs Haus haben! ? ” ( Partei der letzten Chance , 0: 23: 40)� Schlingensief and his shopping collective are kicked out of the store, after first being allowed to finish their purchase. This, Schlingensief argues later, puts the KaDeWe in a critical legal position: Why is someone who is being ejected from a store still allowed to complete their transaction? After expelling the group, the shopping center notifies the police, who respond by sending ten squad cars. Meanwhile, Schlingensief has gone outside to catch some fresh air with Achim, who started feeling nauseous from all the excitement and people around him� As soon as the police appear, they immediately encircle thirty people in front of the building and take down their personal information in order to charge them with trespassing� Schlingensief explains: Das tolle an dieser Einkreisung war, dass dort auch einige Leute dabei waren, die wiederum einfach nur einkaufen waren im KaDeWe� Man weiß eben nicht genau, wer DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 Rethinking Political Assembly in Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 191 will einkaufen und wer hat einen anderen Anspruch� Das KaDeWe behauptet, es wäre eine politische Veranstaltung, was wir da machen. ( Partei der letzten Chance , 0: 24: 10) Interestingly, it is the KaDeWe that labels the event political� An outside entity therefore determined whether this assembly belonged to the realm of art or of politics� Since the assembly grew spontaneously, not all of the participants had T-shirts or buttons, which meant that distinguishing who was part of the action and who was not became impossible� Because of this, the event became an open form without borders, inhabiting the shopping mall like a parasite� By the time the police arrived, the charges were addressed to an arbitrary group of thirty people who were not necessarily those actively involved in the action� Some unknown participants remained like spores inside the building� After being charged with trespassing, Schlingensief named the event the “Brennpunkt KaDeWe” and suggested - similar to the ritual of getting into one’s bathtub once a month - that party members take the escalator at the KaDeWe every Friday at 3PM to see if “everything is still in place” ( Partei der letzten Chance ; 0: 25: 12). Both the ritual and the remaining participants that have not been written up by the police create this ongoing presence� Their physical presence continued as an imprint on the location, or as a parasite, even when authorities attempted to remove it� Einkaufen im KaDeWe provides a point of contrast to Baden im Wolfgangsee regarding the question of physical participation� In Einkaufen im KaDeWe , physical presence does not guarantee active participation in or solidarity with the party or event� Some “participants” were just at the wrong place at the wrong time� 8 In comparison, everyone physically present at Baden im Wolfgangsee is automatically a part of the action� Even though Schlingensief greeted everyone at the lake personally with a handshake - including those who just happened to be enjoying a sunny afternoon there - the distinction between those who participated and those who did not became clear once people entered the lake or the bathtub� The moment of entering the water or sending a proxy such as Jelinek’s floating animals to do it affirmed each participant’s relation to the event and solidarity with the cause� The importance of solidarity was thrown into relief as the action became larger than the live event� While Einkaufen im KaDeWe features physical presence with no intentions of solidarity or awareness, Baden im Wolfgangsee combines physical absence with an outspoken solidarity� At the same time, Schlingensief demonstrates both the failure of assemblies on the level of representation, but also the power of ritual� Failures include the fact that the Wolfgangsee’s water level did not rise high enough and that the shopping group was kicked out of the KaDeWe, but also the fact that Schlingensief himself cannot represent six million other people who are not present� 192 Katharina Schmid-Schmidsfelden DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 While using democratic forms as part of the Chance 2000 party, Schlingensief shows the limits of representative democracy� With the open form of the ritual, institutional control and party leadership dissolves� His suggestion to turn both events into a ritual is the first step towards moving away from centralized control. This specific form of ritual becomes a self-regulating process. In both events, the central aspects are temporality ( jetzt um 16: 00 in Deutschland/ zur falschen Zeit am falschen Ort ), solidarity ( solidarisch mit uns ), and the idea of a seemingly private activity taking place in a publicly accessible location ( Schlingensief geht privat schwimmen/ Achim kauft Unterwäsche ein )� Hannah Arendt writes that the reality of the world which we inhabit together with others is guaranteed for each individual by the presence of all (Arendt 244). There is a certain […] power generated when people gather together and “act in concert,” which disappears the moment they depart� The force that keeps them together, as distinguished from the space of appearances in which they gather and the power which keeps this public space in existence, is the force of mutual promise or contract. (Arendt 244) In this presence, through which we appear to each other, lies a “mutual promise or contract�” While reality is guaranteed for each by the presence of all, Arendt talks about a limited reality when it comes to the smaller entities 9 of sovereignty bound by this (mutual) promise (245). Arendt’s concept of the promise informs my reading of Schlingensief ’s performances of solidarity� A contract among a group of people generates a community (or a “reality” as Arendt would claim), giving agency to people beyond representational democracy� Entering the lake or the bathtub is “acting in concert”; the solidarity with which everyone enters the body of water acts as Arendt’s contract or promise� When we act in concert through political assemblies and expressions of solidarity, there is a mutual promise at stake� The social cohesion grounded by this promise has a unique temporal dimension� We act in concert during the duration of the performance, which ends with our departure� Therefore, solidarity and time transcend the spatial aspect of an assembly and undermine the assumption that a gathering has to happen at the same time and at the same place. Acting in concert - which in this performance is solidarity from afar - does not depend on the presence of physical bodies. Furthermore, the assembly ends with the departure of Schlingensief and his crew and with individuals simultaneously leaving their bathtubs in Germany� Time, therefore, is key to Baden im Wolfangsee , since the act of solidarity exists only for the duration of the performance� If an unemployed person enters their bathtub the next day, this act is no longer related to the performance, since the moment of solidarity occurs only during the given time frame� The distinction DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 Rethinking Political Assembly in Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 193 between who is and is not included in both performances vanishes once we are no longer within a referenced time frame (i.e., either the actual time of the action, or one of the mentioned times of the rituals)� Those performance times, therefore, open and close� Baden im Wolfgangsee also has a relationship to space beyond the here and now� For Arendt, plural action and assembling bodies precede and create the political realm: The space of appearance comes into being wherever men are together in the manner of speech and action, and therefore pre-dates and precedes all formal constitution of the public realm and the various forms of government, that is, the various forms in which the public realm can be organized. (Arendt 199) The public sphere, as Arendt defines it, is the space of appearance, formality, and organization (including institutions). With this definition of the public sphere comes the question of the private sphere� Historically, the rise and success of the “public realm occurred at the expense of the private realm of family and household” (Arendt 29). 10 Further, “mastering the necessities of life in the household was the condition for freedom of the polis ” (Arendt 31). The polis is not just the physical location of the city, but the aforementioned organization of people acting and speaking together: “Wherever you go, you will be a polis ” (Arendt 198). 11 Following Arendt, the public and the private are thus deeply intertwined, since the private is, in fact, the precondition for the public (which is the political). She demonstrates the difficulties of this distinction: the oikos , the home, is the precondition of citizenship� Without owning property or inhabiting a private space, there is no right to public appearance as a citizen� In other words, one has to possess a private sphere in order to appear in the public sphere� At the same time, the home and the private sphere belong to the social realm for Arendt� She argues that “men” are social creatures before they are political ones� The private being the condition for the public and therefore for the political supports the thesis that the private is in fact political� Therefore, when Schlingensief includes people’s private use of their bathtubs as part of the assembly at the Wolfgangsee, the private becomes political� Through reference to the fax message he has allegedly received, Schlingensief draws attention to those private realms, which are as Arendt writes “transformed, deprivatized and deindividualized, as it were, into a shape to fit them for public appearance” (50). The intimate life and its “shadowy kind of existence” (50) is made public through sharing the intimate act of bathing in a private bathtub with a wider audience watching a public act of bathing in the Wolfgangsee in front of cameras and journalists� Judith Butler criticizes Arendt’s approach to appearance in the public sphere, claiming that Arendt does not give enough agency to the private sphere� Butler 194 Katharina Schmid-Schmidsfelden DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 draws attention to the fact that appearances in the public sphere - especially in Greek antiquity - are dominated by men and, therefore, women, who were mostly at home, were silenced: Arendt’s view is confounded by its own gender politics, relying as it does on a distinction between the public and private domains that leaves the sphere of politics to men and reproductive labor to women� If there is a body in the public sphere, it is presumptively masculine […]� And the body in the private sphere is female, aging, foreign, or childish, and always prepolitical. (Butler 75) Butler claims that Arendt’s differentiation between the public and the private is still gendered, whereas according to Butler, both assembly and gender are inherently performative (Butler 75). Performing gender is already a political act, since it involves visibility in the street rather than silence in a private space, invisible to the public. It is important to Butler that different bodies become visible in the public sphere� In Baden im Wolfgangsee this visibility is created by including the private sphere within the larger assembly. Butler reflects on the conditions of assemblies and asks: “What does it mean to act together when the conditions for acting together are devastated or falling away? ” (Butler 23). Political assemblies often exclude bodies, for example those who are unable to walk, march, or shout, or those who are unable to attend for psychological reasons� Protests often require participants to adhere to a certain routine, walk at a certain speed or chant and sing in time� Additionally, care and care work might not allow certain bodies to leave the private sphere, which limits who is allowed to be part of a political assembly� It is essential that “no one acts without the conditions to act” (Butler 76) and therefore: […] politics is not defined as taking place exclusively in the public sphere, distinct from the private one, but it crosses those lines again and again, bringing attention to the way that politics is already in the home, or on the street, in the neighborhood, or indeed in those virtual spaces that are equally unbound by the architecture of the house and the square. (71) Schlingensief plays with the conditions for assembling when he enters the lake and claims that he is going swimming here in private� He implicitly creates a relationship with the people taking private action at home in their bathtubs and those at the lake� The private becomes political through its connection to the public� Taking part in Baden im Wolfgangsee requires traveling to Austria in order to enter the lake together with others. This significant financial undertaking cannot be demanded from everyone, especially not those seeking employment� Butler writes that assemblies should not stand for themselves, but in connection with each other (Butler 81). The simultaneous action of Schlingensief ’s crew at DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 Rethinking Political Assembly in Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 195 the Wolfgangsee and the people in their bathtubs at home demonstrates this relationship, creating a performance that exceeds spatial limitations� In conclusion, elaborating the significance of remote action and solidarity from afar moves beyond the analysis of disruptive aesthetics and spectator responses in previous scholarship� Schlingensief ’s performance Baden im Wolfgangsee privileges remote action and solidarity above the physical presence of participants� In contrast to the action Einkaufen im KaDeWe, solidarity and time extend the spatial realm of the assembly such that a physical gathering does not have to take place at the same time and in the same place� Comparing these two events highlights the possibility and complexities of participation in collective action with and without physical presence. By elaborating the significance of remote action and solidarity from afar, I move beyond the analysis of disruptive aesthetics and spectator responses in previous scholarship, to show that notions of assembly and solidarity that emerge in his performances and their intersection with the private and the public sphere deserve greater scholarly attention� Along these lines, this article brings to light the ways in which Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 rethinks political assembly in the public and private spheres - rather than focusing on the disruptions themselves - by elaborating the significance of remote action and solidarity from afar in contrast to a physical presence� Notes 1 From the party program § 2.A.: “Jeder kann der eigene Talkmaster sein. Jeder kann sich nach dem Willen unseres Grundgesetzes selber wählen� Jeder kann sich im Rollenspiel der eigenen Bedeutung bewußt werden und aus Spiel Ernst machen. Für diesen aus Alltags- und Lebenskunst resultierenden Prozeß wird Chance 2000 Vorbilder und Modelle aus den Misch- und Interaktionszonen von Kunst, Gesellschaft und Politik zur Verfügung stellen.” 2 A hotel where you could “spend the night” with Schlingensief and watch performances, sleep in tents while anticipating the continuation of the election campaign the next day� 3 “[Da] Arbeitslose und andere Minderheiten nur noch als rhetorische Größe, nicht mehr aber real und persönlich vorkommen, […] um nicht den Risiken politischer Fremdbestimmung zu unterliegen […], räumt Chance 2000 als zentrales Auffangbecken und als kommunikativer Mittelpunkt (Partei der Mitte), dem einzelnen zunächst eine Schutzzone ein, in der er / sie bzw� seine Gruppe sich wieder spüren und verwirklichen können” (Parteiprogramm § 2). 4 This outfit was chosen by Schlingensief as an irritation, but simultaneously ads a meta level, as Hegemann explains: “Du machst eben mobil! […] Wenn 196 Katharina Schmid-Schmidsfelden DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 du Rennfahrer geworden wärst, wäre das sowieso alles nicht soweit gekommen! ” ( Partei der letzten Chance ; 1: 40: 26). 5 Jelinek is remotely present earlier in this action as well, when Schlingensief, in his Wahlkampfzirkus , wears the iconic pigtail wig, a specific hairstyle that has become synonymous with her and has been used to allude to Jelinek’s persona by directors such as Frank Castorf, Nikolaus Habjan, and Miloš Lolić. 6 Jelinek explained in an interview in the Austrian newspaper Der Standard (12 Dec. 2003) that her fear of water prevented her from participating directly: “Also ich fürchte mich zum Beispiel auch sehr vor Wasser. […] Ich kann doch so schlecht schwimmen und werde es wohl auch nicht mehr lernen� Das habe ich aber dem Schlingensief nicht gestanden, weil ich mich geniert habe” (“Albträume Interview” n. pag.). 7 Andreas Kotte defines “die drei Felder szenischer Vorgänge: Repräsentation, Präsentation, Selbstpräsentation” (194); three fields, which are all simultaneously present in Chance 2000 � Kotte declares this “Ebenenwechsel” in this case as “offenes System” (194). From the very likely fictional fax message, to the cramp in Hegemann’s leg (“Wenn das nur Theater war, nur eine Inszenierung, ich hatte aber trotzdem einen Wadenkrampf, also ich würde mich ärgern wenn da jemand sagen würde, der war nur gespielt, weil der Wadenkrampf, der war echt” ( Partei der letzten Chance ; 1: 49: 40)), levels of representation of reality and representation reside side by side, creating an aesthetic tension within a real-life political campaign� 8 Andreas Kotte uses Michael Kirby’s model of acting, a spectrum ranging from “rollenlosem Handeln bis zu repräsentierendem Rollenhandeln” (Kotte 195), ‘recieved acting’: “Geht ein Passant über eine Bühne, kann er vom Publikum für der Aufführung zugehörig gehalten werden, ohne dass er das Geringste tut, um sich in das Bühnengeschehen zu integrieren” (195). 9 These smaller entities can be nations/ national borders or political parties, even religious communities� 10 She explains this further in the The Human Condition (29) and ascribes those structural changes to Solon’s legislation in the 5th century BC� 11 The idea of being “a polis ” could be compared to Schlingensief ’s idea of “Du bist 1 Volk,” one person being one Volk, the smallest unit of the state� Works Cited Albers, Irene. “Scheitern als Chance - Die Kunst des Krisenexperiments.” Chance 2000: Die Dokumentation. Phänomen, Materialien, Chronologie � Ed� Johannes Finke and Matthias Wulff. Berlin: Lautsprecher Verlag, 1999. 43—72. DOI 10.24053/ CG-58-0012 Rethinking Political Assembly in Schlingensief ’s Chance 2000 197 Arendt, Hannah� The Human Condition � Chicago: The U of Chicago P, 1998� Butler, Judith� Notes Toward a Performative Theory of Assembly � Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2015� Chance 2000. Partei der letzten Chance � Dir� Kathrin Krottenthaler� Perf� Christoph Schlingensief, Carl Hegemann, Mario Garzaner et al� Filmgalerie 451, 2017� Film� Finke, Johannes, and Matthias Wulff, eds. Chance 2000: Die Dokumentation. Phänomen, Materialien, Chronologie � Berlin: Lautsprecher Verlag, 1999� Forrest, Tara� Realism as Protest. Kluge, Schlingensief, Haneke. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2015� Forrest, Tara, and Anna Teresa Scheer, eds� Christoph Schlingensief. Art without Borders � Bristol: Intellect, 2010� Gade, Solveig� “Putting the Public Sphere to the Test: On Publics and Counter-Publics in Chance 2000�” Christoph Schlingensief. Art without Borders � Ed� Tara Forrest and Anna Teresa Scheer. Bristol: Intellect, 2010. 89—104. Hardt, Michael, and Antonio Negri� assembly . New York: Oxford UP, 2017. Haß, Ulrike� “Kraftfeld Chor: Aischylos, Sophokles, Kleist, Beckett, Jelinek�” Berlin: Theater der Zeit, 2020� Janke, Pia, and Teresa Kovacs, eds� Christoph Schlingensief. Der Gesamtkünstler � Vienna: Praesens Verlag, 2011� Jelinek, Elfriede� Albträume Interview� Der Standard 12 Dec� 2003� Web� 30 Jan� 2024� —. “Laß dir raten: gründe Staaten! ” 1998. Web. 30 Jan. 2024. <https: / / original.elfriede jelinek�com/ fschling�html>� Koch, Lars. “Christoph Schlingensiefs Bilderstörungsmaschine.” Ed. Stefan Habscheid and Lars Koch� Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik 173 (2014): 116—34. Kotte, Andreas� “Der Wechsel zwischen Selbst-/ Re-/ Präsentation�” Theaterwissenschaft. Eine Einführung . Cologne: Böhlau, 2005. 189—201. Loidolt, Sophie� Phenomenology of Plurality. Hannah Arendt on Political Intersubjectivity . New York: Routledge, 2018. Perucci, Tony� “Irritational Aesthetics: Reality Friction and Indecidable Theatre�” Theatre Journal 70 (2018): 473—98. Rebentisch, Juliane: Der Streit um Pluralität. Auseinandersetzungen mit Hannah Arendt. Berlin: Suhrkamp, 2022� Schlingensief, Christoph. “Chance 2000 - The Last Chance Party.” 1998. Web. 1 Sept. 2022. <https: / / www.schlingensief.com/ projekt_eng.php? id=t014>. —. “Parteiprogramm Chance 2000.” 1998. Web. 7 Dec. 2023. <https: / / web.archive. org/ web/ 19991104045644/ http: / www�chance2000�com/ MUSEUM/ Parteimuseum/ Parteiprogramm�htm>�