Matsukaze

The somnambulistic piece Matsukaze, a reworking of theJapanese Nō theatre material of the Master Zeami from the 15th century, recounts the unhappy love of two sisters, the salt water maidens, Matsukaze and Murasame, for the courtier, Yukihira. When he must leave one day, he promises them he will return, for his longing will call him back. But, he dies. The two sisters are left imprisoned by their yearning, become ghosts, return to the living again and again. Only a monk can help them out of their entrapment. Hosokawa’s composition transforms nature moods into tender, loving sounds, plays with silence, traces the passage of time and non-passage of intimate feelings, madness, the relationship between past, present and future, between the fundamental connection of human existence and nature. The world premiere was celebrated in 2011 at the Opéra La Monnaie in Brussels. For the Bayerische Staatsoper production, the director duo Lotte van den Berg and Tobias Staab will now collaborate for the first time with the visual, internationally active artist, Alicja Kwade.

Lotte van den Berg’s productions oscillate between dance, theatre and film and work with both professional and amateur performers. In 2014 she founded Third Space, a small and highly flexible organisation based in Amsterdam, with which she is currently realising her work, and where, together with the visual artist Daan‘t Sas, she initiated the long-term Building Conversation project, among others. Since it started, Building Conversation has developed into an international artists collective, which is fascinated by what happens when we meet one another in conversation. Tobias Staab is a specialist in the interface between experimental electronic music, dance, installative and performing arts. He has launched and curated numerous programmes and festivals. He founded the Ballet of Difference dance company with choreographer Richard Siegal in 2016, and since 2019 has worked as a director in the boundary area between performance, dance and film. He will now collaborate with Alicja Kwade for the first time. The visual artist’s work is inspired by philosophical, scientific and social issues. In her sculptures, she deals with models and structures on the perception of reality, to address the possibilities of subjective and objective knowledge. Together the team will now examine Toshio Hosokawa’s piece, Matsukaze, and the cosmos of opera.