TIMES, TIME, AND HALF A TIME. A HISTORY OF THE NEW MILLENNIUM.

Comments on a cultural reality between past and future.

This blog describes Metatime in the Posthuman experience, drawn from Sir Isaac Newton's secret work on the future end of times, a tract in which he described Histories of Things to Come. His hidden papers on the occult were auctioned to two private buyers in 1936 at Sotheby's, but were not available for public research until the 1990s.



Saturday, December 30, 2017

An Operatic Death of the Old Year


Bryn Terfel and Deborah Voigt in the Metropolitan Opera’s 2011 production of Die Walküre, on the machine, the 45-ton set of movable planks. Image Source: Andrea Mohin/The New York Times.

To celebrate the death of the old year 2017, and remind us that life is but a play and all the world's a stage, here are some gothic shots of recent opera sets. There is no shortage of supposed Illuminati imagery.

Met Opera 2016/2017 production of Mozart's Idomeneo. Image Source: kreattivita.

"History buffs will enjoy I Puritani, which is set in the English Civil War era of the Puritans versus the Royalists. While this production doesn’t quite stick to script when it comes to historical accuracies, taking a few liberties for the sake of the story, it does stick with a universal idea that was relevant to the time period. Diana Damrau and Javier Camarena star as Elvira and her beloved Arturo. Run dates: February 10—February 28 [2017]." Image Source: City Guide NY.

The Met: Offenbach's Les Contes d'Hoffmann (2009 and 2017-2018). Image Source: Opera News.

THE NOSE (Dimitrij Shostakovich) Royal Opera House London (2016). A 1928 opera based on Gogol's 1836 story of the same name. Image Source: Pinterest.


In Australia, Griffith University Opera gained acclaim for two productions in 2017: Debussy’s one act opera, The Prodigal Son and Ravel's The Boy and the Magic. Image Source: Griffith News.



In Canada, Pacific Opera Victoria was promoted for success in the arts locally and nationally (top image): "Pacific Opera Victoria is one of the only opera companies in North America that builds all its own sets, presenting exclusively original productions created in Victoria by its team of artists, artisans and technicians." They performed Madama Butterfly (production 2015-2019). They also contributed to other Canadian operatic productions of The Barber of SevilleImages Sources: Birds of a Feather and Pacific Opera Victoria; also here.

San Francisco Opera’s La Bohème (2014-2018). Image Source: Opera News.

Kansas City Lyric Opera's production of Carmen (2017). Image Source: The Well-Tempered Ear.

Semiramide: Met Opera Live 2017-18 Season. Image Source: Met Opera Live.

Così fan tutte: Met Opera Live 2017-18 Season. Image Source: Met Opera Live.

Luisa Miller: Met Opera Live 2017-18 Season. Image Source: Met Opera Live.


Bregenz Festival: André Chénier Stage, The Opera on the Lake (2011). Image Source: Bregenzer Festspiele / KARL FORSTER via Twisted Sifter.

More from the Bregenz Festival, Austria: Aida by Giuseppe Verdi (2009-2010). Image Source: Twisted Sifter.

Jonathan Meese's opera project MOONPARSIFAL ALPHA 1-8 (ARCHMATRIARCH OF ESPIONARCHY) (2017), in Vienna, Austria. Image Source: Jan Bauer/ Courtesy Jonathan Meese via Artnet.

Salzburg Festival, Austria: William Kentridge, Wozzeck, (2017). Photo: Salzburger Festspiele / Ruth Walz via Artnet.

Paris Opera Ballet: Verdi's Don Carlos (2017). Image Source: Agathe Poupeney/Paris Opera Ballet via NYT.

Octavia. Trepanation. A new opera about the Russian Revolution. From the Holland Festival in the Netherlands: "This opera, which has its world premiere at the Holland Festival, is by composer Dmitri Kourliandski and director Boris Yukhananov, the artistic director of Moscow’s Stanislavsky Electrotheatre. They call it an ‘opera-operation’. On stage stands a giant replica of Lenin's head, the skull of which is being trepanated. Kourliandski's music consists of socialist hymns stretched out in time, texts by the Marxist revolutionary Leon Trotsky and excerpts from Octavia, a play attributed to Seneca about the Roman emperor Nero. Is art capable of explaining tyranny?" (2017). Image Source: Theatre Times.

Florida Grand Opera: "Early Christian asceticism and pagan decadence go head to head" in André Barbe and Renaud Doucet's staging of Massenet's Thaïs (2017). Image Source: WLRN.

Seattle Opera’s production of Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers (Les Pêcheurs de Perles; 2015). Image Source: LA Opus.

Christie digital visuals for Seoul Arts Centre's The Magic Flute (2017). Image Source: BlooLoop.

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