Belgium – Autumn season with Romeo Castellucci
A meeting with Romeo Castellucci took place on 17th September at the Italian Cultural Institute in Brussels, where the artist will be a great protagonist of the Autumn season: as director of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte at La Monnaie; as visual artist at the Bozar on the occasion of the Theodoor van Loon exhibition; as the author of the new project La vita nuova at the Kanal-Centre Pompidou.
Director, stage designer, visual artist, Romeo Castellucci is famous worldwide as one of the most prominent avant-garde theater artists. His creations have been represented in the most important international theatres and theatre festivals in more than fifty Countries.
Castellucci has already been guest of La Monnaie as director of Parsifal by Wagner in 2011, and of Orfeo ed Euridice by Gluck in 2014.
For the Zauberflöte, scheduled from September 18th to October 5th, he «has deliberately stepped back from the narrative dimension of the opera in order to explore its raw emotion and its philosophical heart», as we can read on the presentation of La Monnaie, that is accompanied by a portrait of the artist curated by Piersandra Di Matteo titled A stage philosopher.
In the meeting at the Italian Cultural Institute, Romeo Castellucci has talked about his activity as director of operas together with Peter de Caluwe, artistic director of La Monnaie, and with Nicola Sani, composer and artistic director of the Accademia Chigiana in Siena and former superintendent of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna.
It has not yet been "unveiled" what project Castellucci is preparing for the Bozar on the occasion of the Theodoor van Loon exhibition taking place from October 10th, 2018 to January 13th, 2019.
As regards the new work La vita nuova, we know that: «The sense of a beginning hovers in the air, here, in a large parking lot, where a handful of men has arranged a rendezvous. They are brothers, and they intend to inaugurate a new and better way of living together. Better, compared to what? Compared to the world they have cut themselves off from, their alienated roles, their salaries, politics and art. They no longer believe in these forms of social life». (from the director’s note)
- Die Zauberflöte: info, gallery, trailer and the portrait curated by Piersandra Di Matteo “Romeo Castellucci - A stege philosopher", in La Monnaie web site
Italian Cultural Institute in Brussels
Image: "Die Zauberflöte", rehearsal picture - ©H. Segers /De Munt La Monnaie
(courtesy of La Monnaie)