Der schöne TodTo mark the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage in Norway 1913-2013, the Arctic Opera and Philharmonic Orchestra presents “DER SCHÖNE TOD – the beautiful death” – an opera installation in the name of film history and the history of feminism.
Opera is extremely dangerous for women!
Especially if they are on stage. The chance that the female protagonist before curtain fall will be stabbed, commit suicide, be poisoned by violets, caught in an avalanche she sets off because she sings too powerfully, or that she dies of one seemingly poetic disease or other – that chance is imminently great. But why does she die? The lives that women lead onstage would never have been accepted off stage in their time. Therefore the opera woman is sacrificed on the altar of entertainment, she is objectified and becomes ”the other” that we as an audience can pity, but not feel threatened by. “Der schöne Tod” gives the audience an opportunity to meet characters like Carmen and Isolde in a series of death scenes from the romantic opera’s absolute climax.
The golden age of opera conincides with the birth of film. This new form of entertainment, which would soon overtake as the pop-medium of the era, adopted melodrama in plots and music, popularity and star cult from the opera stage. “Der schöne Tod” gains inspiration from the silent opera film – a well hidden chapter in film history – where entire operas were filmed and screened accompanied by live soloists and orchestra.
“The death of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetic topic in the world” (Edgar Allan Poe)
“Der schöne Tod – the beautiful death” is part of the program for the 2013 Tromsø International Film Festival.
