Intermediality and decadent performance in Anita Berber and Sebastian Droste’s Die Tänze des Lasters, des Grauens und der Ekstase (1923)

Abstract

Few artists embodied the popular definition of decadence as much as Anita Berber in the 1920s cabaret scene of Berlin. Already notorious during her lifetime, Berber was mostly known for her dance performances themed around death, desire and decay, often scandalizing and enticing her audience in equal measure. One series of morbid choreographies, which she performed with husband and dance partner Sebastian Droste, was followed by a book publication of the same name in 1923 titled Die Tänze des Lasters, des Grauens und der Ekstase [Dances of Vice, Horror and Ecstasy]. The book constitutes a collection of expressionist poems resuming the titles of the choreographies, photographed images of dance poses, set and costume designs, drawings by Berber, and critical essays by Droste. In reviewing the relationship between French decadence and German expressionism, this article examines decadence in Berber’s performance with an emphasis on her work’s intermediality. The decadent element of her appeal lies less in her performances in the nude, and more in the choreographies’ interplay with literature, the fine arts, puppetry and photography. This bleeding of one art into the other conditions Berber’s and Droste’s performances aimed at interrupting genre boundaries and social certainties. Ultimately, I argue that the intermediality of decadent performance displaces the performing body from a theatrical stage to a series of referential networks drawn from other media. Decadent performance thus comes to life in the in-between space of medial translation.