Dorothea Hofmann

Migration - Transformation

I moved in as a stranger, I move out again as a stranger. The lyrical self in Franz Schubert's song cycle "Winterreise" wanders, is searching. Is it his personal life's wandering after a failed love, is it a reference to the political situation at the time of its creation – or is it not much more elementary the very existential understanding of wandering as a principle of life? Walking is man's very own way of moving, which is both a challenge and a solution. There are no safely paved paths of life. But even the decision to set off and set off leads forward, leads to something new: to be on the move means to live. "Migration-Transformation" quotes moments from Winterreise, the smallest motifs that develop independently by entering into their own new connections with completely different ideas that they encounter while hiking: the view widens, and wandering becomes change, becomes transformation – into the open. (Dorothea Hofmann)