if I was real - cie. toula limnaios

trailerticketsreviews

»there is no love of life without despair of life.« – albert camus

on the occasion of the 65th anniversary of albert camus’ death, cie. toula limnaios presents a reconstruction of if i was real from 2013, inspired by his early essay l’envers et l’endroit (light and shadow). in camus, light and shadow reflect the struggle between emotion and rationality—a tension that also forms the core of the piece.

»if i was real« explores the paradoxes and ambiguities of human alienation and isolation. in fragmentary images, a mysterious world of hidden connections unfolds. what at first appears strange becomes increasingly familiar—in a way that cannot be put into words.
the dancers immerse themselves in secret rituals, balancing between reality and dream. the choreography plays with illusion and sensuality, without fixing itself to a single meaning. sensory impressions remain open to associations, preserving their original beauty.

upcoming performances
3 – 6 + 10 – 13 dec 2025
tickets

premiere 5 dec 2013

»a round dance of festive wild beauty.« (frank schmid, rbb kulturradio)
»a panorama of fragmentary images, dreamlike, bizarre.« (elena philipp, tanzraumberlin)

cie. toula limnaios is funded by the berlin senate department for culture and social cohesion.
media partners: tip berlin, the berliner

concept/choreography

toula limnaios

music

ralf r. ollertz

dance/creation

rafael abreu, daniel afonso, francesca bedin, félix deepen, karolina kardasz, enno kleinehanding, amandine lamouroux, alessia vinotto

lightdesign

domenik engemann

touring cooperations

marie schmieder

public relation

sarah böhmer

space

toula limnaios

costumes

antonia limnaios, toula limnaios, kristina weiß-busch

fotos

dieter hartwig, cyan

reviews

»the cie. toula limnaios takes a special place in the big dance scene of berlin. it has been working in berlin continuously for 15 year, it has had its own venue – halle in prenzlauer berg for 10 years, and, besides the company of sasha waltz, it is the only company in berlin working with a permanent dance ensemble.
despair and love /// inspired by camus – is the appropriate description of this choreography. namely, the inspirational material were early essays, camus’ erstling light and shadow from 1937. yet, it is impossible to translate camus into images, toula limnaios just said in an interview. however, references can be found: inspired by camus, light and shadow here are to be understood as rejection and acceptance of the world as it is, as consciously experienced strangeness and celebration of its beauty, as despair in life and love for life, all of which inseparably belongs together, as camus says. It’s a field of tension in which toula limnaios nevertheless moves. she does so in her existentially based magical realism, to which poetry and drama belong as sisters. whereas in her new choreography, she surprisingly leaves fate, pain and suffering behind and and takes off into a round dance of festive-wild beauty.« (kulturradio, frank schmid, 2013)

»a janus-faced dance between thin lines /// … spaces slide in and out of each other…
astonishing how toula limnaios and her company, based in the halle tanzbühne for 10 years now, reinvent themselves over and over again.
on the stage divided in three spaces, eight performers wander between worlds. … in the polyphonic solo and group images, the protagonists are barely reminiscent of lone warriors, of ragged individuals who wear themselves out fighting each other. no, in her new work toula limnaios permanently dissolves the powerful unison formations. she creates sensual movement reflections, full of fleeting and sensitive beauty.
inspired by camus’ ›l’envers et l’endroit / light and shadow‹, the versatile company ›cie. toula limnaios‹ bestows us a danced essay on possibilities of being. silent, mysterious, open to new perspectives, a bit crazy.« (neues deutschland, karin schmidt-feister, 2013)