Nico – Sphinx of Ice

The musical theatre piece "Nico - Sphinx of Ice" produced by director Oliver Sturm was based on music by the singer Nico and the fifty-year younger Austrian musician soap&skin, as well as the play of the same name by Werner Fritsch. The piece was a concert monologue by Nico, the legendary female lead singer of the group Velvet Underground, at the moment of her death. The piece did more than simply reconstruct this pop icon; the text examined the personality of a woman who repeatedly changed her identity, exchanged her German background for a life in the pop world, but was ultimately bereft of a place she could call home. Fritsch's monologue revealed her borderline personality which oscillated between glamour and flirts with death, between self-made mythos and loss of self.
The performance combined various media including drama, pop concert, choreography and the fine arts. The artist Till Exit developed a set model that resembled the aesthetics of hyperrealism influenced by Andy Warhol's Factory. The composer Gerd Bessler created a symbiosis of a concert situation and performative installation featuring Nico's music.

Producer and director: Oliver Sturm
Musical director: Gerd Bessler
Set design: Till Exit
Nico / singer: soap&skin (Anja Plaschg)

Schedule and venue:
21 November 2008 (Premiere), 22-23 November & 25-29 November 2008 Sophiensaele, Berlin
November 2009 Kampnagel, Hamburg