Stage and set design
Zaha Hadid
Desire
Helmut List-Halle
Graz, Austria

The opera "Desire" will World Premiere on January 9th for the opening of Graz as Cultural Capital of Europe '2003.

"Desire" is a contemporary opera by Beat Furrer, commissioned by the Steirischer Herbst  in Graz, Austria.  The opera is a present day treatment of the myth of Orpheus, addressing the themes of psychological and emotional metamorphosis, through the tragic love story of Orpheus and Euridice.

The intention for the stage design was to create a landscape that transforms itself, concurrent to the shifting condition of the narrative and the music, creating an immersive, multi-sensual experience of metamorphosis.

The landscape is a distorted grid, comprising a series of moving parts that give rise to a sequence of changing spaces as the narrative journey unfolds.  Strong directional lines zig-zag across the set, representing the conflicting aspirations of the two characters. As the landscape splits open and is sliced in two by the river Stix, the boundaries between inside and outside, upper and underworld, score and stage are blurred, and an emotional volt-face emerges as the stage undergoes this metamorphosis.

The protagonists perform both above and below the landscape, which is either moved into position by the dancers, or changes automatically with the use of a hydraulic system.  The audience experiences a multi perspectival, multidimensional panorama, relating to the shifting states of the narrative.  The view is radically different: one side offering an extended perspective, and the other a much shorter, direct viewpoint - just as Orpheus and Eurydice inhabit divergent conditions.

Helmut List-Halle
Graz, Austria
Further performances   January10, 11, 17 and 18th.

Desire
Music theatre in ten scenes by Beat Furrer
Texts by:  Cesare Pavese, GŸnter Eich, Hermann Broch, Ovid and Virgil
Conductor: Beat Furrer
Director and choreographer:     Reinhild Hoffmann
Stage set: Zaha Hadid

 

January 6, 2002