Freizeit
Bayreuth Artist Talk: Marcus Lobbes

Fotograf / Autor: Markus Lobbes © Markus Lobbes

Join us in 2026 for the Bayreuth Artists Talks Series, an engaging opportunity to connect with the exceptional performers of the Bayreuth Festival. This talk with Marcus Lobbes, Curator and director of the Artistic and Technical Concept of ‘Ring 10010110’ – the 150th Anniversary Ring: “Using new imaging techniques and a mixture of live coding, artificial intelligence, and holography, a monumental tetralogy, a world of power, love, betrayal, and downfall, and at the same time a place of constant transformation, is curated with new imaging techniques. With a mixture of live coding, artificial intelligence, and holography, Marcus Lobbes and his team are creating an experiment of visionary power. Under the title “RING 10010110,” Richard Wagner’s music drama and its reception history take center stage—through a visual level that is constantly changing, expanding, recomposing, and contradicting itself. For the first time in the history of the festival, artificial intelligence will play live on stage – not as a character, but as an imaging force.” These intimate sessions offer audiences a rare glimpse behind the scenes as artists reflect on their careers, share insights into their roles and creative processes, and discuss the unique experience of performing at Bayreuth. With a relaxed and informal setting, these conversations provide a deeper understanding of the works the artists bring to life on stage, making each event a memorable encounter with the people behind the music. As Director of the Academy for Theater and Digitality in Dortmund, Marcus Lobbes is in high demand locally, nationally, and internationally; he is particularly committed to fostering and promoting a wide variety of networks in the performing arts, as well as communicating artistic research — in dialogue with the latest technologies — to theater and educational institutions, policymakers, and the general public. He is also active on numerous committees, boards of trustees, and juries; for example, since 2024 he has served as vice president of the German Academy of Performing Arts and as a member of the board of trustees of the Performing Arts Fund. Since 1995, he has worked as a director, set designer, and writer in musical and spoken theater. His focus is on uncompromisingly contemporary adaptations of classics as well as numerous world premieres and first performances at many renowned theaters across Germany in over 80 productions to date, including at the Düsseldorf Schauspielhaus, the Frankfurt Opera, the Hamburg Opera, the National Theater Mannheim, the State Theaters in Kassel, Mainz, Saarbrücken, Darmstadt, and Braunschweig, the Schauspiel Dortmund, the Theater Freiburg, and the Wuppertaler Bühnen. His artistic signature is characterized by innovative forms of collective work with ensembles and his close collaboration with contemporary writers and composers. In addition to numerous invitations and awards, his approach is also finding its way into the training of young artists: Since 2014, he has been invited as a guest lecturer and speaker to the Academy of Performing Arts in Ludwigsburg, the Mozarteum in Salzburg, the University of Rostock, the University of Applied Sciences Mainz, the Zurich University of the Arts, the Berlin University of the Arts (UDK), the Robert Schumann University of Music in Düsseldorf, and, since 2016, annually to the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz. This in-person-only event will take place at the Arvena Kongress Hotel in Bayreuth, Germany. Interview conducted in English.