“It’s not a show, it’s not an orthodox production. First of all, it’s a symphony. There is normally no staging in symphoniessymphonies are made to be listened to”, says Romeo Castellucci from Berlin, one of the most influential figures on the European scene, about the staging of Resurrectionwhich opens the 2023 season of the Teatro Colón, in a different setting: La Rural.
“In Resurrection –explains the director- I put together Mahler’s wonderful and powerful music, the title ‘Resurrection’, and the image: the corpses coming out of the mass grave. All this is already a kind of puzzle. And you, as a viewer, have to do something with that,” he begins.
“Also you can turn it down, say it’s not for you, and say goodbye. Or you can hate it. But it’s a stronger feeling. You have to choose what to do. Stay, live, love, hate. It’s a choice. The theater must provoke a choice, it must provoke the spectator’s body, ”she says.
Few days before opening Resurrection in Buenos Aires, a stage production of Symphony No. 2, Resurrectionby Gustav Mahler, with the musical direction of Charles Dutoit, dialogues with Romeo Castellucci clarion on the impressive creation that was presented last year at the Aix-en-Provence Festival.
The Italian director was one of the creators of the so-called “theatre of the image”. His works are characterized by a highly suggestive visual language in which music, light and visual arts merge. His education in Bologna is linked to painting, sculpture and art history. A disciple of Carmelo Bene in the theater, he founded his company Societas Raffaello Sanzio more than forty years ago, with his sister Claudia and Chiara Guidi.
He has been to Buenos Aires twice, the first time from 1999 to today Oresteiaand then, in the 2013 edition of FILBA, with On the concept of face in the son of God.
40 years of democracy
As for Resurrectionis a private production, a tribute from the Teatro Colón to the 40th anniversary of the resumption of democracy in Argentina, with a cast led by the soprano Jaquelina Livieri and the mezzo-soprano Guadeloupe Barrientos.
The proposal is also part of Divina Italia, a collaboration between the Teatro Colón with the Italian Embassy in Argentina and the Italian Cultural Institute in Buenos Aires.
The production takes place outside the theater space. Its European premiere was held in an abandoned stadium, at the Stadium de Vitrolles, and here it will be held in La Rural.
A huge expanse of black earth at the scene, a white horse running along it reveals human remainsand the scene transforms into a huge mass grave being worked on by UNHCR (L’agence des Nations Unies pour les réfugiés) staff.
-How would you describe your work in general and Resurrection in particular?
-It’s a work on the memory of images, which in a certain way can wake you up. I don’t invent anything. I put together things that already exist.
But the combination produces friction, creates a third object. And this third object belongs to every spectator, not mine. Why stage a symphony?
It was a challenge that was proposed to me at the Aix-en-Provence Festival and it was a good challenge because somehow you are freer, you can invent anything. But at the same time it’s also dangerous, because you can fall into an illusion.
Was it your decision to do the show outside a theatre?
Yes, it was my decision, but it’s also a necessity that arises from the production itself. It doesn’t work in the theater for many reasons.
In my opinion, the “resurrection” becomes much more powerful in a place where we normally have no narrative. In a rediscovered place: an abandoned factory, anything but the theatre, to reconfigure your gaze, your listening. It’s a way to refresh, maybe refresh isn’t a nice word, your attitude towards an image, towards music.
Music and scene, reconnected
-In a certain sense you are proposing a new way of linking music to the scene.
-Yes, yes, that’s right. Since it is not a mere illustration, I propose something else. But this other thing is deeply linked to the title, which is resurrection.
-What is your interpretation of the concept of resurrection that runs through Mahler’s second symphony?
In Mahler’s mind it is related to Christian resurrection, metaphysics. But in my view, it is not metaphysical. On the contrary, it is completely physical, human. Resurrection is getting out of pain, it is returning to dignity.
So I want to find your name, I want to save you. You are not an animal. You are not a corpse. You are a human being like me. This is an act of mercy. find the names. You are not an animal. You are not a corpse. You are a human being like me. I want to give you back your name, baptize you again, it’s an act of mercy.
-What kind of interaction is there between the scene and the music?
-As I said, it’s not a simple illustration. I think that it’s much more impressive, moving, to go push-pull. The music has its moment of triumphalism, there is a large orchestra, choir. I think instead of emphasizing the triumph it is more impressive, moving, delving into the smallest things, a minimal gesture…
-And the choice to work with minimal elements also helps not to interfere with the music. What role, for example, do the horse, the rain play in the work?
-There are small acoustic events. At first there’s like a soundscape of nature, with birds, and then a single animal comes in. The horse represents the beauty of nature, it is perfection. The horror is hidden. Beauty works on horror, on evil, which is human.
The horse finds something. Thanks to the horse, his master discovers the horror. When the excavations begin, we discover the horror. But also the mercy of other people. So we discovered a kind of spirituality through horror. So it’s a combination of a horrible sight and something opposite, very moving and very spiritual and very merciful.
Rain is the desire to wash everything away forget or refresh; or it is also the promise of a new possibility. Of course, in such a context, rain is also love, tears. And the sound: Mahler is wonderful. I mean, it’s a fresco, a giant fresco, full of energy.
-Mahler wrote a program for the Symphony, with chorus and solo voices, which he later discarded and subsequently denied any programmatic relation to the work. Have you taken this into account?
-For me it was important to read the program, because it refers to the fact that the first part is the memory of a man who died. There is a happy part, the remembrance of the living and the dead, the burial and the ceremony; and then prayer to God, and so on.
But it was impossible for me to follow the dynamics of the narrative. It’s there, but it was much stronger to just have one thing, not this dynamic. The dynamic is internal. The spectator receives this very complicated and articulated music with an image, which proposes a journey to each spectator.
The Dirty War and the Russia-Ukraine War
– Are you aware that your work will have a particular welcome here, given our tragic history during the last military government?
-Of course, your country’s history is impressive and tragic. So I am happy to introduce you Resurrection in such a context. Of the two times I’ve been to Buenos Aires, I remember a strong, sincere audience, and I imagine even more in front of an image like the one you’ll see, which belongs to each one, to their tragic story.
I think the reception will be even stronger than in Europe. I am very sorry that my upcoming premiere in Berlin won’t allow me to be with you.
-Russia’s war against Ukraine had started when Resurrection premiered. It was a terrible prophecy, you were so smitten that you thought about canceling the premiere, right?
-I was shocked. And I had many doubts, if it was correct to do the job. But speaking to the production, my friends, we have decided to continue. It was important for me to tell the audience that it was a coincidence and not an illustration of that situation. I also think it’s best to keep this feeling that it can happen again. This is the tragedy.
-How can art help in these particular moments that we are experiencing?
-I think art is the meaning of life. We are alive, we live in a community, in a society, because art exists somewhere.
Art was the first gesture that someone, perhaps women, drew on the cave wall. And this is the birth of culture. art means culture. Culture means that I can make choices, and choosing is having a conscience, the first act of any policy.
But I don’t believe in theater as a direct action on reality. I don’t believe it. I don’t believe in stage protest. It’s counterproductive, because you’re playing the game your oppressor wants. You have to change the rules of the game. Play your game and, from another world, judge this world. It’s much more intimate.
I personally believe in the intelligence of the viewer. He has to work with me to finish the job.
Information
Resurrection
Opening season 2023 of the Teatro Colón
Music: Symphony No. 2 by Gustav Mahler, Resurrection interpreters: Buenos Aires Philharmonic Orchestra Director: Charles Dutoit Scenography, costumes and direction:Romeo Castellucci Room: La Rural ocher pavilion (Av. Sarmiento 2704), functions: Tuesday 7, Wednesday 8, Thursday 9, Friday 10 and Saturday 11 March at 8.30pm and Sunday 12 March at 7.00pm
Source: Clarin
