Asja Lācis
{{Short description|Latvian actor and theatre director (1891–1979)}}
{{More footnotes|date=May 2022}}
{{Infobox writer
| caption =
| birth_date = {{birth date|1891|10|19|df=y}}
| birth_place = Līgatne, Governorate of Livonia, Russian Empire
| death_date = {{death date|1979|11|21|df=y}}
| death_place = Riga, Latvian SSR, Soviet Union
| occupation = Actress, theatre director, writer
| genre = Epic theatre
| spouse = Jūlijs Lācis, Bernard Reich
| image = Asja Lacis.jpg
| birth_name = Anna Liepiņa
}}
Anna "Asja" Lācis (née Liepiņa; {{langx|ru|Анна 'Ася' Эрнестовна Лацис}}, {{lang|ru-Latn|Anna 'Asya' Ernestovna Latsis}}; {{langx|de|Asja Lazis}}; October 19, 1891 – November 21, 1979) was a Latvian actress and theatre director.
Biography
She was born into the family of a factory worker. A Bolshevik, in the twenties she became famous for her proletarian theatre troupes for children and agitprop in Soviet Russia and Latvia. She believed that children's theater could be used as the cornerstone for the children's general education, which was especially important with poor, proletarian children who often had little or no other educational opportunities.[http://www.documenta14.de/en/south/25225_signals_from_another_world_proletarian_theater_as_a_site_for_education_texts_by_asja_la_cis_and_walter_benjamin_with_an_introduction_by_andris_brinkmanis Signals from Another World: Proletarian Theater as a Site for Education Texts by Asja Lācis and Walter Benjamin, with an introduction by Andris Brinkmanis], South
In 1922 she moved to Germany where she got to know Bertolt Brecht and Erwin Piscator, to whom she introduced the ideas of Vsevolod Meyerhold and Vladimir Mayakovsky.
In 1924 she met the German philosopher and critic Walter Benjamin in Capri, and the duo would have an intermittent affair for the next several years as he visited her in Moscow and Riga. She has been cited as a factor in Benjamin's embracing Marxism.Mark Lilla, "The Riddle of Walter Benjamin" in [http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1995/05/25/the-riddle-of-walter-benjamin/ The New York Review of Books], May 25, 1995 In 1928, Benjamin dedicated a collection of essays to her.[https://eng.lsm.lv/article/culture/culture/national-library-to-recount-fabulous-story-of-latvian-pioneer-of-the-avant-garde.a306404/ National Library to recount the fabulous story of Latvian pioneer of the avant-garde]. Public Broadcasting of Latvia. January 17, 2018
In 1938 during Stalin's Great Purge she was deported to Siberia. Lācis was released and returned to Soviet Latvia in 1948 and spent her old age together with her husband, the German theatre critic Bernhard Reich. From 1948 to 1957 she was the main director of Valmiera Drama Theatre and used the leftist avant-garde techniques in her stage productions.{{Cite web |title=Sākuma lapa |url=https://www.ligatne.lv/lv/ |access-date=2024-10-16 |website=Līgatne}}
Lācis' granddaughter is the acclaimed Latvian theatre director Māra Ķimele.
References
{{Reflist}}
Sources
- {{cite journal |last= Ingram |first= Susan |year= 2002 |title= The Writing of Asja Lacis |journal= New German Critique |volume= 86 |pages= 159–177 |doi= 10.2307/3115205 |jstor=3115205 |issue= 86}}
- {{cite book |last= Latsis |first= Anna |title= Krasnaia gvozdika: Vospominaniia |year= 1984 |publisher= Liesma |location= Riga |language= ru |oclc= 13003307 }}(memoirs)
- Ķimele, Dagmāra and Strautmane, Gunta. Asja: režisores Annas Lāces dēkainā dzīve [Asja: The Stormy Life of the director Anna Lāce]. Riga: Likteņstāsti, 1996.
- Asja Lacis, Revolutionär in Beruf: Berichte über proletarisches Theater, über Meyerhold, Brecht, Benjamin und Piscator. München: Rogner & Bernhard, 1971.
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Category:Latvian theatre directors
Category:Latvian women theatre directors
Category:Latvian stage actresses
Category:20th-century Latvian actresses
Category:Soviet theatre directors
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