Escaping Artist

Where Art Meets Opera.

The latest review of a messy multimedia experiment.

I recently saw William Kentridge’s artistic adaptation of Shostakovich’s 1930s opera The Nose. Based on a Russian short story from 1836 by Nikolai Gogol, it was my first opera at the Met. I have loved opera ever since I saw the Phantom of the Opera when I was six or seven. The richness of that first experience left me with an unforgettable appreciation for the metaphorical, and a love for what seemed to be a kind of theatrical magic. In one of my undergraduate applications under the question, describe your first artistic experience, I described watching a chandelier rise in the first act of that opera. Every city I have lived in, by frivolous necessity, has an opera house, from Montpellier to Richmond. They are always that impressively ornate building located in the heart of downtown. With cool exteriors and dark, saturated interiors they feel a bit like a library, demanding a hushed tone of respect.

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