Musiktheater im Revier, Opera house and theatre in Gelsenkirchen, Germany
Musiktheater im Revier stands at Kennedyplatz in Gelsenkirchen-Schalke, a post-war complex by Werner Ruhnau with two halls. The Großes Haus has 1,004 seats and a 450 m² stage; the Kleines Haus has 336 seats and a 180 m² stage. Its south front is a 4,500 m² glass wall with white vertical profiles and black horizontal mullions, revealing a cylindrical stair core and Yves Klein's blue sponge reliefs.
The building was designed by Werner Ruhnau and opened in 1959 as a major cultural center. It received protected heritage status as a German cultural monument in 1997.
The theatre has borne the name Musiktheater im Revier since June 1966; before that, from 1949 to 1966, it was known as Städtische Bühnen Gelsenkirchen. Its own opera company, chorus and ballet company (directed by Bridget Breiner) perform here, with the Neue Philharmonie Westfalen as house orchestra. Premieres held here include Bernd Alois Zimmermann's Photoptosis in 1968 and Alexander Mullenbach's Die Todesbrücke in 2003.
The Großes Haus and Kleines Haus are separate structures: the Kleines Haus stands slightly offset to the west in front of the main building. The U-Bahn station Musiktheater and the tram and bus stop of the same name are directly nearby. The main axis of the Großes Haus continues north-south as the Ebertstraße pedestrian zone, crossed by Florastraße running east-west parallel to the complex.
The two Yves Klein reliefs on the foyer walls are visible from outside through the glass front. For the 7 × 20 m blue sponge relief, International Klein Blue proved unusable: the acetone-based paint evaporated, lost adhesion and was flammable, so a new blue was mixed, later called "Gelsenkirchen Blue". City graphic artist Uwe Gelesch then made blue Gelsenkirchen's house colour.
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