Saturday 21 December 2013

Great Possibilities

I always thought Opera stagings were either costumey and dusty, or contemporary and slightly awkward. This week I was proven wrong.


In Warsaw's National Theatre, on one of the largest opera stages in the world, scenographer Mariusz Treliński premiered his versions of Tchaikovsky's Iolanta and Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle.






It was like witnessing a whole new genre of art: With spectacular décor stunts like giant Penone-esque tree trunks descending from the ceiling (see first photo), and subtle 3-D projections on an invisible curtain separating audience and performers (third and fourth pics). 


And yet, the staging never stole the show - it placed the stories in a magically timeless sphere, aided by the right amount and the right kind of innovation. Who knew? Opera is back to avant-garde.

See here for the show's making of. 
At New York's Metropolitan Opera in January 2015. 

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