Nils Amadeus Lange has long felt a deep admiration for the composer, abbess, healer, botanist, and poet Hildegard von Bingen. In her texts on female orgasm, her interpretation of the Bible, and her way of composing music, he recognizes queer practices that are still visionary today. An important figure of the twelfth century, her writings and scores have survived to this day. In the performance, Lange examines the use of Hildegard von Bingen’s phytological research and medieval, avant-garde musicological language in contemporary performative rituals.

The artist and ethnobotanist Nils Amadeus Lange presents a performance that explores the dramaturgical potential of the sense of smell: He collects plants and resins and burns them in self-made, space-consuming vessels. He complements this incense ritual with texts on sexuality by Hildegard von Bingen examining the symbiosis of man and nature from a different perspective and also comparing the natural with the supernatural. Thus, a new reality and a different state of mind are created.

Concept, artistic direction, and performance: Nils Amadeus Lange
Performance: Lisa Candidas, Flo Schlessmann
Singing and performance: Mario Espinoza, Catherine Schroeder

Nils Amadeus Lange works in Zurich as an artist, performer, and lecturer. After studying theater at the Bern Academy of the Arts, he expanded his practice to various media, while still keeping a focus on dance and performance and developing numerous international projects. At the center of his practice is the body, which functions as a means of deconstructing social conventions and gender stereotypes.

For the past seven years Lange has been teaching and developing curricula at various universities, in departments ranging from fashion to acting to fine arts, photography, and performance, where he implements alternative forms of learning and experimental approaches. He has been awarded a number of art prizes, of which the 2023 Swiss Art Award and the 2022 Art Award of Canton Zurich stand out most prominently.

His works have been shown at various institutions such as Kunstmuseum Zürich, Kunsthalle Basel, Kunsthalle Zürich, Manifesta 11 Zürich, Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art in Warsaw, Istituto Svizzero in Rome, Belvedere 21 in Vienna, Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève, Swiss Dance Days, Zürich moves!, Gessnerallee Zürich, Frascati Amsterdam, ZÜRICH TANZT, Berliner Festspiele, Kunsthalle Bern, Les Urbaines in Lausanne, Südpol Luzern, Tanzhaus Zürich, CounterPulse in San Francisco, and Cabaret Voltaire in Zürich. 

tranzit.cz is an initiative for contemporary art that has organized the Biennale Matter of Art since 2020, with the 2026 edition currently in progress. tranzit.cz is part of the tranzit.org network, whose principal partner is ERSTE Foundation.