Lighting Designer

"It is a simple and tremendous problem of life: that of fidelity", is how Hugo von Hofmannsthal described the core of their third opera together, Ariadne auf Naxos, in a letter to Richard Strauss. To live does not mean to persevere and hold on to what has been lost. If you want to live, you have to let go, forget, get over yourself - constantly transform yourself. This is what a young opera composer experiences in this work when he is confronted with the stubborn wishes of his patron; just like the protagonist of his opera, Ariadne, who, abandoned by her lover, Theseus, expects only death.

Ariadne on Naxos

Hamburg State Opera

Under the face of the wandering moon, spirit and body quarrel in all their greatness and wretchedness until the blood of two bodies flows. Strauss remains close to Wilde's re-creation of the biblical material, which leads Salome from her mother's tool to autonomy. It is she who, in her unfulfilled desire for the liberatingly different, the body of the prophet Jochanaan, seeks revenge and demands his head - a price the male-dominated society around Herod is willing to pay for their dance. Now that Salome holds his severed head in her hands, she can kiss Jochanaan, possess him if not alive, then dead. As if under a burning glass, Strauss pours Oscar Wilde's demonic dramaturgy into sound like an eruption of the psyche, accompanying his protagonist from her failed escape from the decadence of her existence to her death.

EPSG:4326

Salome

Staatsoper Hamburg

The Norn’s rope of destiny breaks, the world falls apart and the gods idly watch their own demise. People fight to claim power. Brünnhilde and Siegfried are drawn into these power struggles, essentially initiated by Hagen, the son of the ring’s first owner, Alberich. Siegfried dies: however, his death is the harbinger of a catastrophe from which hope for something new can arise.

Götterdäm­merung

Bebelplatz

Siegfried, the son of Siegmund and Sieglinde, is young and dynamic an. Raised by the devious Nibelung dwarf, Mime, he does not know his parents. All that remains of his father are fragments of a sword. Siegfried forges its steel into a new, powerful weapon with which he slays the dragon Fafner. Fafner had been guarding the ring that Siegfried now takes for himself. And he wins over Brünnhilde, whom he awakens from sleep.

Siegfried

Wotan wants to secure power through his descendants. The twins Siegmund and Sieglinde seem to be the perfect choice. One day, fate brings them together. However, for Wotan’s wife Fricka, the sibling’s love is a thorn in her side, and even Wotan himself feels emotionally torn. When his favourite daughter, the Valkyrie Brünnhilde, revolts against him, he puts her to sleep, casting a circle of fire around her that only a fearless person can walk through.

Die Walküre

The Nibelung dwarf Alberich robs the Rhinemaidens of the Rhinegold to forge a ring that confers "endless power". Meanwhile, Wotan, the father of the gods, is forced into action. To reward the giants Fasolt and Fafner for building the castle Valhalla, he steals the Nibelungs’ treasure with the help of Loge, the cunning fire god. Alberich curses the ring and all its future owners – the tragedy takes its course.

Das Rheingold

The gruesome image presented right at the beginning of Handel's opera Giulio Cesare in Egitto (1724) would warrant a trigger warning, given today's sensitivities. After the welcoming chorus for Caesar and the solemn declarations of peace, a severed human head appears—the head of Caesar's political opponent, the Senate favorite Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus.

Giulio Cesare in Egypt

House for Mozart

Opera in three acts by Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897–1957)
Libretto by Paul Schott (Julius and Erich Wolfgang Korngold) after the novel
«Bruges la morte» by Georges Rodenbach

Die tote Stadt

Opernhaus Zürich

The Grail Knights are a brotherhood sworn to strict chastity. They guard two relics that promise salvation and eternal life: the Holy Grail and the Holy Spear. However, after their king Amfortas breaks his vow of chastity with the mysterious Kundry, the spear falls into the hands of Klingsor, a former knight expelled from the order, who uses it to inflict an unhealable wound on the king. According to prophecy, only a "pure fool made wise by compassion" can save Amfortas from eternal agony and retrieve the spear. Gurnemanz, the brotherhood’s spiritual leader, believes that the naive Parsifal is this new saviour. But Parsifal has a long path of enlightenment to tread first …

Parsifal

When the revolutionary and painter Mario Cavaradossi secretly attempts to help a political fugitive to escape the city of Rome, his lover, the famed singer Floria Tosca, believes he is cheating on her with another woman. Her jealousy is exploited by Scarpia, the unscrupulous chief of police, in order to help him capture Cavaradossi. Scarpia then makes Tosca an offer: if she gives herself to him for one night, he will release her lover.

Tosca

The war is over, and tragedy takes its course: the mother and her lover murder the father upon his return. The daughter hides her brother, keeping him safe. – Every day, Elektra thinks of her murdered father, plotting blood-stained celebrations of victory and waiting for the moment when her brother, reared as an avenger, returns. Under one roof with her father’s murderers, thirst for blood and revenge collide with the future plans of her younger sister, who longs for marriage and children, a life in harmony and bliss. The mother is governed by another delusion: “It is not a word, it is not pain, it does not pinch me or strangle me, … and yet it is so terrible that my soul wishes it had been hanged, and every part of my body cries out for death.” Sacrifice is meant to bring relief.

Elektra

The war is over, and tragedy takes its course: the mother and her lover murder the father upon his return. The daughter hides her brother, keeping him safe. – Every day, Elektra thinks of her murdered father, plotting blood-stained celebrations of victory and waiting for the moment when her brother, reared as an avenger, returns...

However, he coolly rejects her. When her sister's fiancé dies at Onegin's hands on her name day, he flees society. Years later, the dandy meets Tatyana again, who is now married. Now he suddenly discovers his intense affection for her. Tatyana, however, remains faithful to her husband - Prince Gremin - and rejects the desperate Eugene Onegin, even though she loves him.

Eugen Onegin

Vienna State Opera

In a village community that holds firm to archaic customs, the young hunter Max must pass a marksmanship test so he may marry his sweetheart, Agathe. Of all times now when his shooting has been very much below par! Carl Maria von Weber and his librettist Friedrich Kind fluctuate between ghost story, fairy tale, fortune play and interplay between heaven and hell. The plot centres around a diabolical ritual in the “Wolf's Glen”, where a pact is made with Samiel to cast magic bullets that never miss their target. Its composer declared that the opera was celebrated by its world premiere audience in Berlin in 1821 with the, “most incredible enthusiasm”. In the decades that followed, the piece, at the time considered nature-oriented and traditional-romantic, swiftly became one of the most performed operas on German stages. And little wonder it was: In an age with a popular yearning for cultural, national identification opportunities, Der Freischütz offered a projection surface for an ideal community. So what about this opera appeals to director Dmitri Tcherniakov today?

Lighting Designer

Gleb Filshtinsky

Events

Upcoming events

Jan 15 - Feb 13, 2026

Tosca · Staatsoper Berlin

Apr 14 - May 8, 2026

Elektra · Staatsoper Hamburg

22 - 31 May, 2026

Eugen Onegin · Wiener Staatsoper

26 - 29 Jul, 2026

Der Freischütz · Bayerische Staatsoper

Past events

Nov 16 - Dec 4, 2025

Ariadne on Naxos · Staatsoper Hamburg

5 - 12 Oct, 2025

Salome · Staatsoper Hamburg

About

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