. >> egyptian artist wael shawky is a frequent traveller between cairo, venice, sharjah, and new york. he's just arrived in hamburg, and the first thing he needs is a coffee. then he's off to the theater of the world festival to premiere his latest work. >> the acoustic is fantastic here. >> "the song of roland" is his reworking of the bloodthirsty epic poem, one of the oldest surviving major works of french literature. >> a collection between fact, myth, and also a celebration of being a european white man. >> with his earlier work "cabaret crusades," wael shawky gained an international reputation. it's an account of the medieval crusades from the islamic perspective. the slaughter and pillage of the crusad lasted nearly 200 years, a history many in the west would prefer to forget. shawky traces the history using marionets, startg with pope urban ii, who in the year 1095 initiated the first of seven crusades. in the course of these religious wars, jerusalem, damascus, and aleppo went up in flames, as did constantinoplewhere the crusaders became synonymous with warscruelty d brutality