MACGUFFIN

 

In Lambert Ludwig’s staging “MacGuffin”, every detail of a legendary art auction in 2008, at which a record price for a piece of contemporary art was reached in record time, is minutely recreated. The audience can, just like Cary Grant in “North by Northwest”, sit among the bidders, disguised as an interested party, and experience the course of events at close quarters. In consciousness of the past and the inevitability of the events, and at the same time experiencing a staged actuality, the centre of the happening - the art work being auctioned - becomes a nebulous governor, whose (imaginary) presence drives the motivations of the apparent bidders.