Support for culture
Lukas Keller inspires an appreciation of theater
The AKB Foundation is promoting theater pedagogy at the Gandersheim Cathedral Festival. Starting this year, Lukas Keller has sought to instill a love of theater among children and youngsters at Lower Saxony’s largest professional open-air theater.
We believe it’s important to inspire tomorrow’s audiences and introduce kids to the theater at an early age,” says Michael Büchting, Chairman of the AKB Foundation. The Gandersheim Cathedral Festival also aims to foster culture in the region. 24-year-old Lukas Keller was appointed as the new theater pedagogue in Bad Gandersheim this year. “With him and our new rehearsal center, we can open up a whole new world of creativity for the entire Southern Lower Saxony region,” says artistic director Achim Lenz.
Theater pedagogues aim to inspire an appreciation of theater – especially among young people of school and kindergarten age, as well as adults and seniors. And that work in Bad Gandersheim has also been expanded recently to include patients with psychosomatic illnesses at the local Paracelsus Roswitha Hospital.
Theater pedagogue at Gandersheim Cathedral Festival: Lukas Keller
Photo: Frank Bertram
Sometimes, you do not grasp aspects of a play when you go to the theater. It often helps to get to know the characters and subject beforehand. Introductory workshops are therefore held for every age and target group. Lukas Keller led the workshops for the stagings of “The Jungle Book” and Goethe’s “Faust,” which attracted around 270 children and youngsters. 446 kids and young people took part in the poster painting contest organized for the children’s and family play in the summer, and there were a particularly large number of entrants from the Teichenweg Primary School in Einbeck.
Once the Gandersheim Cathedral Festival season is over, the three theater clubs for adults, youngsters and children will start again in November and are open to everyone in the region. “We welcome ideas for projects from other organizations involved in child and youth work and education or from cultural institutions,” says Lukas Keller. “However, other establishments such as nursing homes, hospitals or companies can work with us as well, and we’ll tailor the projects to them.”
Lukas Keller: Instilling an appreciation of culture in the region
Lukas Keller grew up in Osterode am Harz, not far from Bad Gandersheim. After completing secondary school, he worked in the Theater Pedagogy department of Württemberg State Theater in Esslingen during his year of voluntary social work in the cultural sector. He then studied cultural and media education with a focus on theater and literature, as well as film and digital media, at the Ludwigsburg University of Education. He is currently taking a master’s degree in cultural mediation at the University of Hildesheim. The theater and media pedagogue has gained experience in stage direction at youth theater clubs through his work in designing and managing several projects in the Stuttgart region. As part of that, he also acquired diverse intercultural skills from working with people from different communities and in different phases of their life. |
INFORMATION
The AKB Foundation
The AKB Foundation was established in 1998 by Carl-Ernst Büchting (1915– 2010), the long-standing Chairman of the Executive Board and later of the Supervisory Board at KWS. Its work centers on the Southern Lower Saxony region, specifically Einbeck, and on Klein Wanzleben (Saxony-Anhalt), the place where KWS was founded. The foundation’s values are steeped in the concepts of sustainability, humanity and future viability. The foundation promotes charitable goals and offers funding in five categories: “the church, Christian faith and ecumenism,” “art and culture,” “education and social welfare,” “science and research,” and “protection of the environment, countryside and nature.” More information: www.akb-stiftung.de |
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