Wilfried Lentz Rotterdam

On the night of July 22 at 2:00 am, a hundred years after the fire of 1911, the Teatro Margherita was the subject of an intervention consisting in the simulation of a fire, to bring back a memory that has left an open wound in all citizens. A ritual gesture to exorcise the fear of the past. The Teatro Margherita, for its unique feature of rising over the water, offers the possibility to define and characterize a fluctuating space in a state of transition from a previous use and its current and future reuse.
The reflected light of the fires on the waters of the sea coast, wrapped the building in a warm and bright embrace, perhaps suggesting a vision already present in the collective imagination of those who by chance passed by there or stopped on the pier along the road, on the balconies of the surrounding houses or from the distance of the sea. The Theatre, still asleep in the darkness, began to awaken a few hours after midnight, and like a beating heart he came to life under a blanket of red light.